What You Need

TO LEAD an Early Childhood Program

Emotional Intelligence in Practice

Holly Elissa Bruno

National Association for the Education of Young Children Washington, DC

National Association for the Education of Young Children 1313 L Street NW, Suite 500 Washington, DC 20005-4101 202-232-8777 • 800-424-2460 www.naeyc.org

NAEYC Books

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Through its publications program, the National As- sociation for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC) provides a forum for discus- sion of major issues and ideas in the early childhood field, with the hope of pro- voking thought and promot- ing professional growth. The views expressed or implied in this book are not necessar- ily those of the Association or its members.

Permissions “To a Robin in Lent,” from THE WAVE-MAKER by Elizabeth Spires. Copy- right © 2008 by Elizabeth Spires. Used by permission of W. W. Norton & Company, Inc. Finding Strengths Exercise © Dr. Claire Forest. Used with permission from Dr. Katie Palmer House and Dr. Claire Forest, Empowerment Skills for Family Workers: Instructor Manual. To order the original publication, see www. FamilyDevelopmentCredential.org/publications.php. The National Family Development Credential Program is located at the University of Connecticut, Pediatrics Dept.

Credits Cover and inside photos: copyright © by Ellen Senisi Contributing editor: Catherine Cauman Copy editor: Lisa Cook

What You Need to Lead an Early Childhood Program: Emotional Intelligence in Practice Copyright © 2012 by the National Association for the Education of Young Children. All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America.

Library of Congress Control Number: 2011943664 ISBN: 978-1-928896-80-7 NAEYC Item # 363

Holly Elissa Bruno, MA, JD, attorney and keynote speaker, hosts the online radio program Heart to Heart Conversa- tions on Leadership: Your Guide to Making a Difference on bamradionetwork.com. She teaches graduate leadership and law courses at Wheelock College and National Louis University’s McCormick Center for Early Childhood Leader- ship. Having served as assistant attorney general for the state of Maine, assistant dean at the University of Maine School of Law, and dean of faculty and associate profes- sor at University of Maine–Augusta (UMA), she was named UMA’s Outstanding Professor.

Holly Elissa’s keynotes engage and inspire audiences from Reykjavik, Iceland, to Budapest, Hungary, and from Honolulu, Hawaii, to Anchorage, Miami, Chicago, Austin, San Diego, Tulsa, and Spearfish, South Dakota. She believes early childhood leadership is one of the most powerful positions anyone can hold.

About the Author

Thank you to my mentors: Michael Gonta, Nelle Smither, Arthur LaFrance, Madeline Birmingham, and each of my students from West Charlotte Senior High School. With appreciation to the guests on my radio program, Heart to Heart Conver- sations on Leadership: Your Guide to Making a Difference, beginning with Louis Cozolino in 2010. Thank you, inspiring and steadfast colleagues: Kay Albrecht, Lorna Backus, Sue Baldwin, Ruth Ann Ball, Paula Jorde Bloom, David Bloomfield, Joanna Booth-Miner, Pam Boulton, Suzi Brodof, Beverlyn Cain, Vicki Calderone, Mary Cecchinato, Hooray Childers, Neila Connors, Doreen Dubuque, Bess Emanual, Virginia Epps, Marcia Farris, Robin Fox, Cynthia Gamez, Janet Gonzalez-Mena, Marsha Hawley, David Heath, Luis Hernandez, Joyce Holman, Gwen Hooper, Cathy Jones, Liz Kendall, Otto Kroeger, Marie Ellen Larcada, Dawn Lui, Michelle Manganaro, Evette McCarthy, Kiki McWilliams, Barb Milner, Gladys Montes, Gwen Morgan, Bonnie and Roger Neugebauer, Sue Offutt, Kyra Ostendorf, Bjork Ottarsdottir, Sandy Owen, Betty Pearsall, Rae Pica, Peter Pizzolongo, Helen Post Brown, Donna Rafanello, Hile Rutledge, Jorge Saenz De Viteri, Alicia Smith, Errol St. Clair Smith, Jo-anne Spence, Debra Sullivan, Barbara Tacchi, Alan Taylor, Julie and Larry Thorner, Ann Terrell, Kim Tice & team, Nancy Toso, Susan Twombly, P. Gail Wilson, Vernon Wilson, and Nancy Witherill. With gratitude for the support of Adrienne Beaupre, Catherine Cauman, Marina Colonas, Judy Conway, Joyce Dattle, Gita Devi, Douglass College alumnae, Wendy Dun- ning, Akimi Gibson, Jane Gottko Marcozzi, David Hoffman, Derry Koralek, Jay Manning, Jo Obin, Jan Patten, Cindy Popp-Hager, Jacqueline Raicek, Brian Roach, Ronni Rowland, Karen Vivieros, Brandy Ward, and Caitlyn Williams. With a smile to mia famiglia, Nick and Lily Bruno-Hymoff, Richard Harrison, Lynne Bissonnette Pitre, Louise Riggs Bruner, Vincenzo Bruno, the Gorg family, Karen Bruner Hull, Art and Concetta Bruno, Susan Bruno, Toby Grapelli, and Walla.

Acknowledgments

For Michael Gonta, who, in two months, 56 years ago, made this moment possible.

Contents

Preface…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….vii

Part I—Forming: Setting Up the Program and Yourself for Success……………………………………………………………….1 Chapter 1 Five Essential Leadership Competencies: You Heard It Here……………………………………………….3

Chapter 2 Smart Heart-to-Heart Leadership: Honoring Emotional Intelligence…………………………………..15

Chapter 3 Making Tough Decisions: The Art and Science of Decision Making……………………………………31

Chapter 4 Leading on Purpose: The Road to Making a Difference………………………………………………………51

Part II—Storming: Identifying, Preventing, and Addressing Resistance to Change…………………………………….77 Chapter 5 Getting Started: Wherever You Are Is the Place to Begin……………………………………………………79

Chapter 6 Partnering with Change………………………………………………………………………………………………………95

Chapter 7 Preventing Legal Issues: Policies and Procedures…………………………………………………………….115

Chapter 8 Creating a Community of Problem Solvers: Winners, Not Whiners…………………………………..129

Part III—Norming: Establishing Management Systems………………………………………………………………………………147 Chapter 9 Supervision and Staff Development: Social EQ in Action………………………………………………….149

Chapter 10 Financial Management: Holding the Purse Strings………………………………………………………….173

Chapter 11 Do No Harm: Building Safe, Sustainable, Healthy Learning Environments……………………..193

Chapter 12 Curriculum Choices: Roots and Wings…………………………………………………………………………..217

Chapter 13 Marketing and Development: If You Build It, They Will Come………………………………………..233

Part IV—Performing: Putting Principles into Practice………………………………………………………………………249 Chapter 14 Every Child’s Family: Building Partnerships…………………………………………………………………..251

Chapter 15 Quest for Quality: Professionalism Isn’t Just a 15-Letter Word……………………………………….269

Part V—Re-Forming: Renewing, Refreshing, Dreaming of What Might Be………………………………………………..293 Chapter 16 Leadership Principles to Take with You: Learning to Love the Questions………………………295

vii

Preface

What do you need to succeed as a leader?

• Proper academic credentials

• Solid business plan

• Articulated vision and mission

• Budgeting expertise

• Knowledge of the latest leadership theory

• Well-designed buildings with green play areas

• Mastery of health and safety standards

• Time management expertise

You may have all of these capacities and still be struggling as an early childhood leader. What are you missing? You know the answer: Relationships. Unless we can build and maintain honest, productive, and dynamic relationships with everyone we encounter, we cannot be excellent leaders. Unless we can build effec- tive teams, our carefully crafted vision statement will gather dust. Unless we inspire our staff’s trust, we cannot bring out their best. Unless we earn the respect of families, our business plan will never be fulfilled. Without people skills, even the most stellar aca- demic credentials are just capital letters after our name. “I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” With these words, poet Maya Angelou reminds us of how invaluable it is to build connections with the people we en- counter. This ability to put people at ease, earn their trust, and inspire their dedication to quality is called emotional intelligence (EQ). What You Need to Lead an Early Childhood Program: Emotional Intelligence in Practice is the first and only early childhood leadership book anchored in what matters most: EQ, the art and science of building relationships. Emotional intelligence is the ability to read people as well as you read books and to know how to use that informa- tion wisely. Each chapter begins with a case study that features richly complex, every- day challenges facing early childhood program directors. Alongside case studies are EQ theory and principles, pointers and problem-solving steps to help you practice and hone your leadership skills. To lead with EQ is to read the story behind the story. Can you hear the cry for help beneath a parent’s outburst? Or the unstated fear that sabotages a teacher’s openness

viii Preface

to a new approach? Leading an early childhood program requires learning the unspo- ken language of every individual and team. Valuable as rational analysis is, logic cannot translate these languages. Author Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s Little Prince explains: “It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye.” Emotional intelligence is not magic, nor is it “soft” science. EQ can be measured and learned. Current research in the growing field of neuroscience documents the physical, neuron-to-neuron impact we have on one another. For example, without one word being spoken, the human heart electromagnetically communicates a “Great to see you” or “Keep your distance” message to people within five feet of us. In addition, research shows that the brain’s ability to make effective consecutive decisions declines after three or four hours. Yet, how many of us forge ahead, unaware that our brain has hit the snooze button? Sixty-five to ninety percent of human emotion is communicated without words. Leaders need to listen with the heart as well as the mind. Our leadership practices, informed by neuroscience research, can be sharpened and polished to greater effectiveness. Thanks to f MRI (functional magnetic resonance imaging), research on the adult brain is now as compelling as research on the newborn to three-year-old’s brain. Knowledge liberates. When we know how the brain func- tions, we can partner with its idiosyncrasies and not feel restrained by uncomfortable thoughts and reactions. To lead with EQ is to lead with confidence and integrity. As we build and refine our EQ capacities, our confidence as leaders grows commensurately. What You Need to Lead an Early Childhood Program: Emotional Intelligence in Prac- tice covers the entire realm of a leader’s responsibilities, from financial management to marketing, supervision to assessment, and health and safety to preventing legal troubles. What makes this book unique and engaging is the human focus in each of these areas. What You Need to Lead is the new edition of Leading on Purpose: Emotionally Intelli- gent Early Childhood Administration. This edition incorporates the latest research, theo- ries, and practices a leader must know, while retaining the best of the original book. Examples of new and updated topics include:

• Research findings by Adam Bryant on the five essential skills of successful leaders

• How to avoid legal troubles in the age of social networking

• Courage: What is it, where do we find it, how do we use it?

• QRIS: New evaluation tools to assess our leadership and our programs

• Using the brain to stay cool under pressure—the neuroscience of button pushing

• Eliminating whining in the workplace

• New practices to comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act, as Amended (enacted January 1, 2009)

• Working with immigrant families, legally and culturally

• Gender issues in leadership

• When should a leader apologize?

• What do you do if your boss is the problem?

• Managing Millennials, Gen-Xers, and Baby Boomers in the same workplace

• Building teams where women predominate

ixPreface

The new edition also features podcasts of interviews with a variety of early child- hood professionals. Starting in 2010, as the host of the online radio program Heart to Heart Conversations on Leadership: Your Guide to Making a Difference (bamradionet- work.com), I have had the pleasure of conducting live interviews with experts, authors, practitioners, and futurists in the field of educational leadership. Interviews with Neila Connors (If You Don’t Feed the Teachers, They Eat the Students), Meg Wheatley (The New Science and Walk Out, Walk On), Adam Bryant (The Corner Office), Phyllis Chesler (Woman’s Inhumanity to Woman), Robert Sutton (Good Boss, Bad Boss), Stephanie Feeney (Professionalism in Early Childhood), Roy Baumeister (Willpower), and Rick Kirschner (Dealing with People You Can’t Stand) are a click away! Their answers are revealing and thought provoking. Thanks to those interviews, What You Need to Lead shimmers with direct quota- tions and insights not found anywhere else. I ask the questions most of us want to ask but feel we shouldn’t; my guests open up and tell the truth. The links to the podcasts of these interviews are noted in the page margins, so you can follow them online. Telling the truth is the core of What You Need to Lead. As you turn each page, you are invited to resolve sticky dilemmas, identify your underlying gifts, activate your sense of humor, illuminate your blind spots, apply the latest leadership theories, and be the best leader you can be. This book honors your individual learning style through a variety of print, online, and hands-on resources. The following resources are conveniently featured in the mar- gins and highlighted in the text:

• Opportunities to assess where you stand on issues

• Case studies to ponder and resolve

• Quotations to inspire you

• Podcasts featuring interviews with leadership experts

• Invitations to reflect on what you have learned from your own experience

• Choices about which steps you will take next

In addition, if you lead workshops or are a teacher educator, at the end of each chapter there are questions for reflection and team projects to engage participants in professional development sessions and to extend the learning of students in early child- hood education courses. Finally, as an attorney, I have given special attention to the legal conundrums early childhood leaders face: providing and acquiring authentic references for job applicants; handling custody disputes at pickup time; instituting no-babysitting policies; allow- ing smokers to work with young children; facing an intoxicated parent walking out the door with her infant; and preventing confidential or otherwise damaging material from appearing online. The text includes policies, procedures, and, above all, clear (nonle- galese) and direct information. With emotional intelligence and accurate information, you will find what you need to lead in each page you turn. Your response to What You Need to Lead matters to me. I value your feedback, insights, questions, and ideas for change. Contact me at hollyelissabruno.com. Now, read on to explore the uncharted territories of original leadership!

Forming Setting Up the Program and Yourself for Success

Part I

1. Five Essential Leadership Competencies: You Heard It Here

2. Smart Heart-to-Heart Leadership: Honoring Emotional Intelligence

3. Making Tough Decisions: The Art and Science of Decision Making

4. Leading on Purpose: The Road to Making a Difference

1 Five Essential Leadership Competencies: You Heard It Here

Case Study—Vanessa Director Vanessa is in a bind. She’s been nominated for president of her AEYC affiliate organization and is scared she will fail. Vanessa works well behind the scenes, loves getting results, and seems to please everyone. She knows, however, that as president she will have to address long-standing organizational power struggles and speak in front of hundreds of people. Both of these prospects scare her silly. At times, Vanessa feels like an imposter: “Everyone thinks I have it all together. If they knew the terrible mistakes I’ve made, they would kick my sorry self to the curb!” Should Vanessa run for president, given the internal and external challenges she is sure to face? Do leaders have to present a false image of perfection in order to succeed?

There is a close relationship between truth and trust. —Fred Rogers, You Are Special

3

Would you believe me if I told you that early childhood leadership is one of the most important jobs anyone could ever hold? Who else inspires children to love learning for the rest of their lives? Who else welcomes and embraces every child’s family—newly arrived immigrants, single dads, elderly grandparents, two moms, and teen parents? Who else squarely faces and addresses legal issues that set the precedent for every educational institution that follows? Who else goes home at the end of the day, exhausted for sure but knowing without a doubt that she or he has made a difference in someone’s life?

4 Part I Forming

Effective leaders are forever learning, both about their own strengths and chal- lenges and about what makes relationships work. Not every lesson we learn is neat or pretty; supervising resistant staff members can put us face-to-face with our own blind spots. We may not be able to help every child with special needs or prevent our budget from being cut to the bone. We can, however, choose our own attitude, whatever comes our way. In early childhood, we lead through relationships. We touch other people deeply, just as they touch us. Building healthy, happy relationships is both an art and a science. Beginning right now, shall we set off on a treasure hunt to discover what we need to lead, humbly and elegantly, powerfully and gently? We’ll stop to explore eye-popping neuroscientific studies, liberating theories of leadership, and the hard-earned wisdom of seasoned colleagues. Our quest? To uncover the hidden dynamics of effective rela- tionships so we can lead with savvy and authenticity, never leaving home without our sense of humor. Are you ready? Here’s the first clue.

Heart-to-heart conversations on leadership Did you intend to become a leader? Some of us, without our planning it, discover we have to make a choice: Step up to lead, or forever after wonder what we might have missed. Late in 2009, I received a curious e-mail with an even more curious question: Would I create and host an online radio program for education leaders? BAM radio network’s Emmy award-winning executive producer, Errol St. Clair Smith, promised I could inter- view anyone I wanted and ask whatever questions I chose. Join us, he said, in pushing the envelope in educational journalism. Who likes to fail, especially publicly? Not me, that’s for sure. Yet how else would I learn unless I risked failure? Despite the steepest of learning curves, I knew I needed to step up. I accepted Errol’s challenge. As I often say, “Life’s too short to be boring.” Heart to Heart Conversations on Leadership: Your Guide to Making a Difference “went live” in 2010 on the Leaders Channel. Now, with one quick click at your computer to http://bamradionetwork.com, you can tune in to podcasts and hear leaders, experts, authors, and colleagues tell their truths and share their latest research on what leaders need to succeed. When people are asked to share what matters, they generally do. Each of my guests levels, “heart to heart,” about his or her hard-earned leadership lessons—what we need to leave behind and what we need to undertake. Those leaders’ experiences, research, and insights prove that effective leaders manage through relationships, not control. In fact, leading is relating. This book is for smart, heart-to-heart, everyday leaders—the relationship builders. It shines a light on the qualities of the best leaders and guides us in making our own light shine a little brighter.

Indispensable and unexpected lessons Pulitzer Prize–winning New York Times journalist Adam Bryant wanted answers about what makes a leader successful. For his book The Corner Office: Indispensable and Unex- pected Lessons from CEOs on How to Lead and Succeed (2011), Bryant taped more than 70 interviews with leaders from disparate fields. Among them are Teach for America’s

Leaders aren’t neces- sarily the smartest people in the organiza- tion, but they are the best students of human nature. . . . A leader’s real job is to ask ques- tions, not to have the answers.

—Adam Bryant (podcast)

All sorrows can be borne if you put them into a story or tell a story about them.

—Isak Dinesen Out of Africa

5Chapter 1 Five Essential Leadership Competencies

founder and CEO, Wendy Kopp; the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater’s artistic direc- tor, Judith Jamison; Harvard University’s president, Drew Gilpin Faust; and Disney’s CEO, Roger Iger. In his interviews Bryant booted out the usual questions, like “What are the most important competencies leaders need?” Instead, he asked soaring questions: “How do you do what you do?” . . . “How did you learn to do what you do?” . . . “What lessons have you learned that you can share with others?” Bryant found the results—the five traits of successful leaders listed above—both “indispensable and unexpected.” As you manage through relationships, these strengths will serve you well. Let’s dive for pearls in each of Bryant’s findings.

u EXERCISE YOUR EQ n Which traits describe you? Which is your greatest strength? Which is an area for improvement?

Passionate curiosity Do you love learning more than you fear failing? Are you willing to set aside presump- tions and challenge your own thinking? Passionately curious leaders

wrestle with tough issues. . . . They ask big-picture questions. They seem like eager students who devour insights and lessons, and are genuinely, enthusiastically inter- ested in everything going on around them. . . . They wonder why things work the way they do and whether those things can be improved upon. They want to know people’s stories, and what they do. (Bryant 2011, 13)

The leader doesn’t have to be the smartest person in the organiza- tion, Bryant noted when I interviewed him. Instead, effective leaders are the “best students of human nature” (podcast). The mental agility fostered by boundless curiosity allows a leader to take risks and envision alternatives, even when the proven approach still works. Motivated by the desire to stay fresh and be more effective, passionately curious leaders question what others take for granted. They often lead first and analyze later. In his book, Bryant quotes the CEO of technology company Nvidia, Jen-Hsun Huang, as saying, “I ac- tually like making decisions with intuition. I like to validate the decision with analytics. I don’t believe you can analyze your way into success. I think it’s too complicated. You have to use intuition, which is everything—your artistic sensibility, your intellectual sensibility, experience” (2011, 15). Roger Neugebauer, cofounder with his wife, Bonnie, of the World Forum Founda- tion, carries his passionate curiosity to a global level. About wanting to see with his

He is educated who knows where to find out what he doesn’t know.

—Georg Simmel

Bam!radio

“The 5 Traits of Successful Education Leaders”

Interview with Adam Bryant

Heart to Heart Conversations on Leadership

Bryant’s Five Traits of Successful Leaders Passionate curiosity: Deep sense of engagement with the world; burning need to

know “What’s it all about?” Battle-hardened confidence: Track record of facing down, learning from, and grow-

ing stronger through adversity. Team smarts: Bringing the best out of staff teams, by using or altering the organiza-

tion’s unwritten rules. Simple mindset: Ability to see through information overload to the heart of the matter. Fearlessness: Willingness to think differently, despite pressure or inertia, and risk

making changes for the better.

6 Part I Forming

Bam!radio

“Why Education Leaders Can’t Succeed Without Thinking Globally”

Interview with Roger Neugebauer

Heart to Heart Conversations on Leadership

http:/bamradionetwork.com

own eyes and hear with his own ears what early educators around the globe are doing for children, Neugebauer observed,

Children in our care right now will inherit a vastly different world. My grandparents grew up in South Dakota and never left their county. My parents didn’t travel outside the country until they were in their 60s. Bonnie and I didn’t travel internationally until we were 22. Our children, before they were 21, had traveled to Estonia, India, Turkey, Russia, China, and New Zealand. I can’t fathom what the world will be like for our grandchildren. (podcast)

Each time Roger and Bonnie prepare for the next World Forum, they travel the world, meeting and dialoguing with educators . . . from Afghanistan, Kenya, South Af- rica, Malaysia. In their travels, they are endlessly curious, passionate about discovering leaders who are making a difference and, as a result, forever learning.

u EXERCISE YOUR EQ n  What sparks your curiosity? Are you always on a quest to learn and understand more? What compels you to remain a lifelong learner?

Battle-hardened confidence Vanessa, in the chapter case study, has a track record of getting results. She is well respected enough by colleagues to be nominated for a vital leadership position. Yet Vanessa doubts herself and feels like “the great pretender.” What would it take for Van- essa to overcome her self-doubt and confidently lead her affiliate? Bryant discovered that successful leaders share a second trait: hard-earned con- fidence in their ability to learn from and face down adversity. Confidence is rarely the same as cockiness. Self-doubt, unlike humility, is not always productive. What kind of confidence in their abilities must leaders have? In his book, Bryant says of these lead- ers, “They have a track record of overcoming adversity, of failing and getting up off the mat to get the job done. They have battle-hardened confidence” (2011, 24). They may have faced adversity in their professional lives or their personal lives, or both. Wherev- er the difficulty is, leaders don’t run from it. Bryant quotes Nvidia’s Huang as observing, “There are some people who, in the face of adversity, become more calm” (25). Teach for America founder Wendy Kopp wanted to know the “personal character- istics that differentiate the people among our teachers who are the most successful” (Bryant 2011, 30–31). Kopp’s researchers discovered perseverance is a successful teacher’s most important trait. Kopp describes persevering teachers as

people who, in the context of a challenge . . . have the instinct to figure out what they can control, and to own it, rather than to blame everyone else in the system. And you can see why in this case. Kids, kids’ families, the system—there are so many people to blame. . . . And it’s so much about that mindset—the internal locus of control, and the instinct to stay optimistic in the face of a challenge. (Bryant 2011, 31)

Perhaps bleeps and bumps on a résumé indicate more depth than a résumé with a perfect record. Facing the worst and squeezing out the best hones a kind of battle- hardened confidence. Having survived battles, a leader knows that each new problem is one more in a line of challenges that can be dealt with and learned from. After all, as the folk saying goes: “A diamond is a chunk of coal that made good under pressure.” Gus Lee, ethics faculty member at West Point, summarizes battle-hardened confi- dence in one word: courage. Lee defines courage as the “ability to identify your highest possible moral action and then to do it without worrying about risk to self” (podcast). To act with courage, Lee says, leaders need discernment along with critical thinking. To

There is no education like adversity.

—Benjamin Disraeli British prime minister

The wise don’t expect to find life worth living; they make it that way.

—Anonymous

7Chapter 1 Five Essential Leadership Competencies

discern what to do when facing adversity, Lee recommends a three-part process. Ask:

• What’s the most selfish thing I can do? (The answer is always obvious, Lee says.)

• What is the most pragmatic thing I can do, that would solve the problem and in the process make me look good? (Again, Lee notes the answer to this question is often easy.)

• What’s my highest possible moral act? What’s my purpose, my highest goal, and what must I do, regardless of fear? (With battle-hardened confidence, choosing the high- est moral act becomes more natural.)

Lee warns that we tend not to use this resource—our ability to discern—enough. Equipped with battle-hardened confidence, we are more likely to stand alone, when we have to, to do the right thing. Otherwise, lacking battle-hardened confidence, we make fewer courageous decisions. Lee observes: “The moment my staff senses I am acting out of self-interest, fear, or cowardice, I can no longer lead. Leaders must inspire others to be their best selves. If a leader doesn’t inspire that, he’s just a manager” (pod- cast). In keeping with Bryant’s observations about risk taking for the greater good, Lee adds, “Once we decide holding our job is our top priority, we sacrifice courage.”

Team smarts Team smarts begins with an “understanding that teamwork is built on a foundation of one-on-one interactions among people, an unwritten contract that has nothing to do with business cards, organizational charts, or titles” (Bryant 2011, 41). With team smarts, leaders “know how to create a sense of mission and how to make people feel like everyone’s getting credit. They know how to build a sense of commitment in a group” (40–41). Much of team smarts sounds like using EQ—emotional intel- ligence, or the ability to read people as well as we read books—and then acting wisely on that information. Bryant quotes Susan Lyne, CEO of Gilt Groupe: “I think that I now have a very strong antenna for someone who is going to be poison within a company” (2011, 50). Trusting our gut instinct about an employee often pays off. How many of us have held on to an employee either because we hoped she might change or because we feared we wouldn’t find anyone bet- ter? Team smarts adds up to trusting our gut to say goodbye to the poor performer, opening the door to a more qualified applicant. In our interview, Liz Wiseman and Greg McKeown invited us all to evaluate our team smarts as staff motivators (podcast). Their research shows that 48 percent of leaders fail to bring out the best in their employees. Called “Diminishers,” these bosses assume that employees cannot accomplish difficult tasks on their own. A faulty assumption made by Diminishers is to falsely assume that they can involve staff only in low-stakes issues. Lacking in team smarts, a leader may undermine the team’s motivation to perform well. In contrast, the leader with team smarts and emotional intelligence tones down her “enlightened” presence to put the spotlight on her staff’s potential. A leader with team smarts is a “Multiplier,” say Wiseman and McKeown. Multipliers devote significant time to listening to and observing their employees. With passionate curiosity, a Multiplier takes the time to uncover what matters to each employee. Does Reginald adore pro football? Ask Reginald how his favorite NFL coach’s team smarts might be appropriate to use with young children.

Think about yourself and the people you work with. What have you each been through in your life? What got you here? What makes you worth knowing—and trusting? What fires your creativity? What makes you real—and valuable? If I can’t know what you feel, what matters to you, then . . . we are little more than a face and a name to each other; you are not deep or alive to me, nor I to you.

—Robert K. Cooper and Ayman Sawaf

Executive EQ: Emotional Intelligence in Leadership and

Organizations

If you judge people, you have no time to love them.

—Mother Teresa

Bam!radio

“Do You Have the Courage to Be an Effective Educational Leader?”

Interview with Gus Lee

Heart to Heart Conversations on Leadership

“Leadership Styles: What Works, What Works Better”

Interview with Liz Wiseman

Heart to Heart Conversations on Leadership

8 Part I Forming

To develop team smarts, Wiseman and McKeown (podcast) encourage us to:

• Move out of “answer mode” and into “question mode.” Effective leaders know that the best questions cause people to think.

• Assess how you might be inadvertently discouraging your staff.

• Operate in a mode of intellectual curiosity: Listen to learn.

• Go beyond what is comfortable. Commit to discovering each employee’s hidden value, especially those employees you assume are the team’s weak links.

As Bryant (2011) says, a leader with team smarts not only knows the unwritten rules of the organization but also chooses wisely which of those rules to overthrow and which to honor. One unwritten rule may be: “The director will rewrite everything we do, so don’t bother to write well.” The leader with team smarts knows to amend that unwritten rule through word and action: “Do your best writing; I appreciate that.” Does your leadership challenge teachers to step up and be leaders in their class- room and beyond? Leaders with team smarts move out of the limelight to let their employees shine. Wiseman tells us even to tone down our billowing enthusiasm to make room for teachers’ enthusiasm to bubble up. In doing so, you may discover and multiply employee contributions.

Simple mindset Do you feel pressured or distracted by the flurry of data available to you? If you feel overwhelmed, imagine how you might be flooding your own team with “TMI” . . . too much information! Everyone appreciates the person who sees and tells the simple truth. With a no-nonsense, cut-to-the-chase approach, a leader can focus a team’s attention. Bryant (2011) says the best leaders avoid information overload, and instead extract the one or two things that matter. He makes the point, for example, that most people don’t pay much attention to PowerPoint presentations that go on and on. All those lists and charts and cute cartoons may entertain, but do they tell you what’s im- portant? “Death by PowerPoint” is Bryant’s label for such unnecessary complexity. Why deliver an hour-long presentation when five minutes would be more effective? Maintain- ing a simple mindset is the fourth trait of powerful leaders. What does Bryant mean by “simple”? Consider the presenter who skips the PowerPoint altogether and “simply talks, giving a short pitch for her idea, backed up with three key facts” (2011, 52). We all deal with TMI. Torrents of data flow at us from our computer screens. How can we sort through information overload to pinpoint what matters most? The leader who cuts to the chase clears a path to her staff. Concise leaders are respected and powerful. Keep it simple. Keep it clear. Business leader Guy Kawasaki complains,

Schools could do a better job teaching the value of brevity. . . . What you learn in school is the opposite of what happens in the real world. In school, you’re always wor- ried about minimums. You have to reach 20 pages and 50 slides. They should teach students how to communicate in five-sentence e-mails and with 10-slide PowerPoint presentations. . . . No one wants to read War and Peace e-mails. Who has the time? Ditto with 60 PowerPoint slides for a one-hour meeting. (Bryant 2011, 55)

Author Russell Bishop (podcast) maintains that program staff and family hand- books are frequently weighed down by wordy, tiresome, and often outmoded policies and procedures. Sure, we require new employees to initial that they have read and un- derstand these policies. But can a new employee fully understand what policy B-4.c in

There’s an ocean of data on the Internet we all have access to, just a few clicks away. The leader has the ability to look at that ocean and pull out 13 things that matter. As a leader you need to distill the message.

—Adam Bryant (podcast)

Fear can push us to obfuscate or to cover up our own lack of cer- tainty with long-winded, confusing explanations. Courage allows us to tell it like it is.

Go to http://multipliers- book.com/accidental- diminisher to take a brief quiz.

9Chapter 1 Five Essential Leadership Competencies

Section IV means? Leaders have the power to use the simple mindset to streamline those policies and make them into living, meaningful guideposts. Bishop calls his simple mindset approach the “stop, start, and continue” process. Use this process with your team to cut out the fat in long-winded, hard-to-understand policies. Simplify your staff and parent handbooks so everyone is clear on expectations. Imagine that a staff member who initials that she has “read and understood” everything in the staff handbook actually means it! To initiate the stop, start, and continue process to simplify policies:

• STOP using unnecessary or wordy sections in the policy.

• START writing simple policies.

• CONTINUE using policies that work.

Bishop has seen cumbersome documents reduced to one meaningful cut-to-the- chase statement that everyone understands and can rally behind. For example, let’s apply his stop, start, and continue method to policies for online communication. Many Internet policies are pages long, referencing every imaginable social networking site and terms relevant to those sites. For example, a Facebook policy might enumerate who can be “friended” and who cannot. By the time such a policy is posted, three new social networking sites will have leapt into popularity and current sites will have bitten the dust. To simplify your Internet policy with Bishop’s simple mindset approach: • STOP: Ask, “Why do we need an Internet usage policy?” • START: Identify what your bottom line on Internet usage should be. • CONTINUE: Save anything worthwhile in the current policy. Internet policies require staff to be as professional online as they are in person. A simple professionalism policy (more on this in Chapter 7) will set a standard for online behavior that will outlast today’s wordy list. Pick up your handbook. Do you need to lift weights to do that comfortably? If so, now is the time to “Simplify, simplify,” as Thoreau advised us in the nineteenth century.

u EXERCISE YOUR EQ n This simple mindset trait can take time to develop. Can you explain what your work is in one minute? Which of your policies could use a start, stop, and continue overhaul?

Fearlessness Do you see yourself as a fearless leader? Fearlessness is the willingness to do the right thing regardless of the consequences. You may lose colleagues. You may be ridiculed. You may hear: “You’re fired!” My Head Start colleague Dennis Ichikawa describes fear- lessness as stepping into the dark guided by your inner light. To assess our level of fearlessness, Bryant asks:

• Are you comfortable being uncomfortable?

• Do you get bored when things seem too settled?

• Do you like situations where there’s no road map or compass?

• Do you start twitching when things are operating smoothly, and want to shake things up?

Bam!radio

“Silly Teacher Policies: How to Change Them”

Interview with Russell Bishop and Deborah J. Stewart (8/16/11)

Heart to Heart Conversations on Leadership (Leaders Channel)

I’ve missed more than 9,000 shots in my ca- reer. I’ve lost almost 300 games. Twenty-six times I’ve been trusted to take the game-winning shot and missed. I have failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed.

—Michael Jordan

10 Part I Forming

• Are you willing to make surprising career moves to learn new skills?

• Is discomfort your comfort zone? (2011, 62)

Ursula Burns of Xerox describes fearlessness as

Seeing an opportunity even though things are not broken. The company is not headed toward a wall. It’s not broken, but there is definitely a way to do it better and someone will actually say, “Things are good, but I’m going to destabilize them because they can be much better and should be much better.” (quoted in Bryant 2011, 63)

To be fearless, leaders need to let go of the belief that security is more important than truth. No one said being fearless is easy. Valora Washington, founder of the CAYL (Community Advocates for Young Learn- ers) Institute and president and CEO of the Council for Professional Recognition,

embodies this willingness to take action and shake things up. In our interview, she notes that differences between elementary school edu- cators and early childhood educators can deteriorate into a one-up, one-down impasse: “Historically we’ve had a lot of prejudices in each sector” (podcast). Rather than running from this impasse, Washington brought both groups to the table: “We all have to lead by changing. We all have to acknowledge there are performance gaps at both levels. We all need to take collective responsibility for problem solving” (pod- cast). Elementary teachers can learn more about using developmen- tally appropriate practices, and early childhood teachers can learn ways to help children successfully transition to elementary school. In Washington’s book Ready or Not: Leadership Choices in Early Care and Education (2007), she and coauthor Stacie Goffin challenge us to be fearless in creating a more welcoming environment for tomorrow’s adults.

Journalist Megan McArdle takes fearlessness to the next level. In her interview, she asks: Can leaders fail and be successful? To McArdle, failure is an essential part of lead- ership. We have to model failure, she argues, if only to show children how to learn and bounce back. Being fearless virtually ensures that we will, at some point, fail (podcast). When asked about the “gotcha” factor prevalent today, McArdle says leaders need to buck the “one strike and you’re out” trend to create cultures in which failure is a natural part of learning. Geoffrey Canada, founder of Harlem Children’s Zone, encoun- tered failures all along his 20-plus years of improving learning environments for chil- dren, their families, and their community. Had Canada quit at his first failure, he would never have been able to uplift the lives of thousands. Fearlessness, although full of risk, creates the change we need.

an unexpected question about power Adam Bryant’s five traits of successful leaders set standards for authenticity, but they do not directly confront the issue of power. What is a successful leader’s relationship to power? How does she exercise power? How do employees determine whether a leader is powerful? Batia Wiesenfeld and her colleagues’ research (2011) explores that very question: Can a leader be fair and have the power to succeed? As educators, we assume lead-

Bam!radio

“Can the Pedagogical Divide Between Early Childhood and Elementary Educators Be Bridged?”

Interview with Valora Washington

Heart to Heart Conversations on Leadership

“When Leaders Flunk: The Critical Role of Failure to Success in Education”

Interview with Megan McArdle

Heart to Heart Conversations on Leadership

http:/bamradionetwork.com

11Chapter 1 Five Essential Leadership Competencies

ers need to be compassionate, participatory, respectful, and fair. In an early childhood program, wouldn’t a despot be quickly overthrown, if not directly then by passive resistance? To the contrary, Wiesenfeld discovered. In fact, leaders who treat employees with fairness and respect actually diminish their own power. “Our results suggest the opposite of intuition,” Wiesenfeld says. “Lead- ers who treat people with dignity and give them opportunities to speak up consistently are seen as being less powerful.” Her research shows that leaders perceived to be fairest were not as likely to be promoted into positions of greater power. Wiesenfeld “worries that we don’t have the time frame to allow fair leaders to bubble up through the system” into powerful positions. Wiesenfeld and her colleagues’ research might appear to focus on how a leader’s own boss views the leader. In other words, an executive director may promote a “tough” director over a compassionate one. Curiously, the research shows that employees hold the same perception. Authoritarian leaders, who show less con- cern for their employees, are perceived by their employees as having more power. In the end, leaders are measured by their effectiveness, especially by how successful they are at winning funding and favor from higher-ups. Teachers may turn against you if you don’t have the power to be effective, regardless of how fair or caring you are. Wiesenfeld’s counterintuitive conclusions may be troubling. Most likely, early child- hood leaders need to exercise power with both compassion and toughness. A fair and respectful leader must also maintain integrity steely enough to make those “buck stops here,” impossible decisions.

Integrity: “Only a mediocre person is always at his best” At the heart of effective leadership is integrity. Integrity is that admirable trait of being true to your word, true to your values, and authentic in your actions. A leader’s integ- rity is golden. Authenticity is the touchstone of integrity. An authentic leader is one of a kind, self-defining, and far from perfect. She em- braces and grows through her own history, regardless of how tainted it may be. Every human being who has made a difference has been a flop at one point or another. Most leaders have embarrassing or flawed histories. Who hasn’t made a mistake, told a lie, or done something regrettable? A leader with integrity doesn’t pretend to be anyone other than herself, “warts and all.” As the 12-step slogan says: “We are only as sick as our secrets.” Your secrets and mistakes are out there. Embrace them and be grateful for the lessons they grant you.

You heard it here Whatever checklists or theories we use to define and understand leadership competen- cies, we are skating on the surface unless we take a sounding for integrity. Your integ- rity determines your legacy as a leader. Martin Luther King Jr. knew: “The time is always right to do what is right.” Our treasure hunt is under way: What will you take away? May your strengths be affirmed and your challenges become less daunting.

Bam!radio

“The Surprising Role of Power in Education Leadership”

Interview with Batia Mishan Wiesenfeld and Eric Sheninger

Heart to Heart Conversations on Leadership

To the extent that we can be emotionally honest—getting out of our head and into the heart, using well-chosen words to say what we truly feel and believe—we find our voice, we become real.

—Robert K. Cooper and Ayman Sawaf

Executive EQ: Emotional Intelligence in Leadership and

Organizations

12 Part I Forming

reflection questions 1. How fearless are you? Can you name a risk you took that turned out well? If taking

the risk led to a failure, how did that experience affect your future actions? When other people are touched by the risks you take, can you be fearless on their behalf, or do you need to be cautious? What is the next risk you need to take but have been avoiding?

2. Do you have a simple mindset that allows you to laser through to the heart of the matter? Is that a skill you had to develop, or is it a skill that has always come natu- rally to you? If thinking like a laser is difficult for you, what steps might you take to develop a simple mindset? To practice the simple mindset, name the point you found most compelling in this chapter.

3. Would you call yourself “passionately curious”? If so, what drives you? If not, what holds you back? Recall an occasion when you let go of your own assumptions in order to break through to new understanding. Do passionately curious leaders value security? Can they create environments that feel safe to their employees?

4. How do you define integrity? How do you know if someone has integrity? Do you view yourself as having integrity? Is integrity a trait we always have and use, or can we sometimes act with integrity and other times not? Name two people you know, one famous, one from your own life, who have integrity. Does their authen- ticity differ from their integrity, or is it the same thing?

team projects 1. Where do you stand on whether leaders can fail and still succeed? Find out what

directors and other leaders have experienced in bouncing back from failure. Interview at least three directors about their experiences with, feelings about, and lessons learned from failure. Do they think in today’s “gotcha” culture that leaders can fail without losing their jobs or careers?

2. Wiseman and McKeown’s research reveals that many leaders are unaware of how they may intimidate or otherwise hold their staff back from doing their best work. Read their study and conclusions (see Bibliography and Web Resources at the end of this chapter). Do you think their findings apply to early childhood leaders? If so, what changes do leaders need to make to uplift rather than minimize employ- ees?

3. Explore the history of a leader you admire. Does this statement from earlier in the chapter describe that leader: “Every human being who has made a difference has been a flop at one point or another. . . . Most leaders have embarrassing or flawed histories. Who hasn’t made a mistake, told a lie, or done something regrettable?” How can we embrace our flops and flaws and work them into our understanding of what it means to lead?

4. As a team, decide how would you coach Vanessa, the leader from the case study. What questions would you want to ask her? In your judgment, what will determine whether Vanessa should accept the nomination? Reread the Mr. Rogers quote that opened the chapter: “There is a close relationship between truth and trust.” How might that insight help you coach Vanessa?

It is authenticity that will be most effective in marshaling teams to work together to achieve a shared goal.

—Adam Bryant The Corner Office: Indispen-

sible and Unexpected Lessons from CEOs on How to Lead

and Succeed

13Chapter 1 Five Essential Leadership Competencies

Bibliography Bishop, R. 2011. Workarounds that work: How to conquer anything that stands in your way at work.

New York: McGraw-Hill. Bruno, H.E. 2010. Creating relational sanctuaries for children who suffer from abuse. Child Care

Exchange Jan/Feb: 64–68. Bryant, A. 2011. The corner office: Indispensable and unexpected lessons from CEOs on how to lead

and succeed. New York: Times Books. Cooper, R.K., & A. Sawaf. 1997. Executive EQ: Emotional intelligence in leadership and organiza-

tions. New York: Putnam. Kellerman, B. 2006. When should a leader apologize—and when not? Harvard Business Review

84 (4): 72–81. Lee, G. 1994. China boy. New York: Penguin Books. Robinson, B.E. 2007. Chained to the desk: A guidebook for workaholics, their partners and children,

and the clinicians who treat them. 2d ed. New York: New York University Press. Schwartz, T., with J. Gomes & C. McCarthy. 2010. Be excellent at anything: The four keys to trans-

forming the way we work and live. New York: Free Press. Washington, V., & S.G. Goffin. 2007. Ready or not: Leadership choices in early care and education.

New York: Teachers College Press. Wheatley, M., & D. Frieze. 2011. Walk out walk on: A learning journey into communities daring to live

the future now. San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler. Wiesenfeld, B., N. Rothman, S. Wheeler-Smith & A.D. Galinsky. 2011. Why fair bosses fall behind.

Harvard Business Review 89 (7–8): 26–30. Wiseman, L., & G. McKeown. 2010. Managing yourself: Bringing out the best in your people. Har-

vard Business Review 8 (5): 117–121.

Web resources Bam!radio: The Voice of the Education Community

www.bamradionetwork.com Leadership Characteristics That Facilitate School Change

www.sedl.org/change/leadership/character.html Level 5 Leadership: Achieving “Greatness” as a Leader

www.mindtools.com/pages/article/level-5-leadership.htm Multipliers: Accidental Diminisher Quiz

http://multipliersbook.com/accidental-diminisher Principals Identify Top 10 Leadership Traits

www.educationworld.com/a_admin/admin/admin190.shtml Walk Out Walk On: From Hero to Host

www.walkoutwalkon.net/united-states/a-story-of-citizenship-in-columbus-ohio

2 Smart Heart-to-Heart Leadership: Honoring Emotional Intelligence

Case Study—Victoria “You know those tedious classroom portfolios the director wants us to do? I’m not do- ing mine. Let’s all just fake it. She’ll forget about them eventually anyway,” prods toddler teacher Roxie, just as the director, Victoria, steps into the staff meeting. Roxie, sensing her director’s outrage, plasters on a prizewinning smile, and chirps, “Hey, Victoria. I bet you and your gorgeous family had a great weekend!” All eyes anxiously flick between the beet-faced director and the Cheshire cat teacher. What will Victoria say and do in the face of Roxie’s public show of disrespect?

15

Here’s the truth about being an early childhood leader: Each moment of the day is an adventure. You arrive early, optimistic and full of energy, only to find an enraged parent pacing at the door. You cuddle a baby in the infant room just as the baby spits up her breakfast. You get a text message from the cook saying she met the man of her dreams and has eloped to Greece. You determine that accreditation is just what your pro- gram needs, then overhear teacher Roxie whipping up discontent. To lead in our field, you have to be “smart heart-to-heart,” with a sense of humor that never goes on vacation.

16 Part I Forming

u EXERCISE YOUR EQ n We all have blind spots, times when we didn’t see criticism or disagreement coming. When have you been momentarily stunned by someone’s behavior? What is a smart heart-to-heart way to prevent or address Roxie’s disrespect- ful behavior?

Day-at-a-time leadership: Perfection is the enemy of the good We all have our challenges. I have a fear of heights. Not a stop-take-a-deep-breath-and- all-will-be-well fear, but a heart-diving-out-of-my-chest, Jell-O knees, get-me-out-of-here- NOW fear of heights. To complicate things, I cannot predict when the fear will strike. So, I live my life as if I were carefree, staying true to my adventuresome soul. One September, while exploring the Scottish Borders, I drove up a winding one-lane road unprotected by guardrails. Angling the car around brassy sheep that shot me “Get over yourself, lady; this was our road first” looks, who had time to look down? At the sign for Gray Mare’s Tail, Scotland’s tallest waterfall, I parked the car at the bottom of hills awash in purple heather. Up the sides of the gorge we climbed, under the spell of the champagne air, called by the water’s rumble and the promise of nesting plovers. Why I turned and looked straight down into the gorge, I do not know. In a heart- beat, my throat closed and my knees melted. I froze until I could, painstakingly, put one foot in front of the other to undo my climb. When the panic released its grip, I stopped again to notice how lovely the heather was close up, and how grateful I was to have climbed so high. I learned from that bittersweet, blindsiding experience. Leadership can be like that hike in Scotland . . . or the encounter in the case study with Roxie. We aim for the moun- taintop. Keep our eyes on the prize. Breathe in the view. Yet, even when inspired by the loftiest of goals, we can still be blindsided by the unexpected. Success isn’t measured by being the “perfect” leader. Perfection is for the gods. Success is measured through our everyday heart-to-heart interactions. Everyday lead- ers sometimes blow it, sometimes succeed. We stumble and get it wrong, but we still work our hearts out to make a difference. Everyday leaders, always in process, learn as we go—we learn especially to forgive ourselves for not making it to every mountaintop. This chapter is a guide to triumphing over your blind spots and enjoying your accom- plishments in a field that is not your typical, everyday business.

Early childhood education: Not your typical business Describing everything an early childhood leader does during her day can be dizzying. We negotiate contracts, oversee building projects, master QRIS (quality rating and improvement systems), plunge toilets, listen to aggrieved teachers, calm angry parents, and advocate with legislators for better education budgets. And we do all this before 11:00 in the morning! Your typical business has separate departments such as human resources, market- ing, development, operations, quality assurance, and finance. An early childhood leader is all those departments rolled into one person. Later in this book, we will examine what it takes to perform these functions well. For now, let’s acknowledge the direct ap- plicability of the slogan made famous by the sign on President Harry S. Truman’s desk: “The buck stops here”—with the early childhood leader.

The only way out is through.

—Robert Frost

Few will have the great- ness to bend history itself; but each of us can work to change a small portion of events, and in the total of all those acts will be written the history of this generation.

—Robert F. Kennedy

17Chapter 2 Smart Heart-to-Heart Leadership

Our “products” are not jet engines or computer screens. We support and nurture each child and adult to become who he or she is meant to be. We do this even when funding is slashed or our infant room floods. The needs of children and their families come first. The stakes are high, even if the pay or status is not. We work with intangibles, and often the indefinable. What’s a toddler’s smile worth? Can you quantify how deeply your heart is touched when a difficult child, now grown into a beaming adult, returns to say, “Thank you, you made a difference in my life”? At the end of the day, despite our to-do lists crabbing at us, we sleep well after we count our blessings. We work with children at a time when their young brains are most receptive to learning. Our curricula help children explore and make sense of their world. We witness miracles. The silent child sings. The shy teacher takes a stand. The immigrant father observes his son making new friends. We are in the business of opening the door to every educational experience that follows. All educators are in the business of children’s learning. But early childhood educa- tors set the standard for the learning a child will undertake for the rest of his or her life. Nurture a child’s curiosity. Help her formulate questions. Help him believe in his gifts. Model how to live peaceably with people who are not like you. The child will carry these lessons with her, and in turn, the lessons will carry the child through hard times. We cannot be mediocre and lead organizations that accomplish all of this.

When we see ourselves as others see us Being in the business of early childhood care and education brings another distinction. Only early childhood educators suffer being called “glorified babysitters.” We hear a lot, “It must be nice to get paid for playing with children.” Rodney Dangerfield got it right: We don’t get no respect. We do well to remind ourselves: “What other people think of me is none of my business.” Leading in a field that is, in some people’s eyes, low in status and, in everyone’s eyes, low in pay brings serious challenges. Our graduates choose professions that pay more money. Our employees struggle to support their families. Elementary schools hire away our best teachers. And those are just the visible consequences. Invisible consequences are often more hurtful. Even the most gifted teachers, if they do not have degrees, see themselves as second rate. Staff turnover is high, especially when the economy sags. To keep our ratios in compliance with regulations, we might hire people who are not as qualified as we want, and in whom we end up investing inordinate amounts of time. We expend additional time and energy, precious resources we can’t afford to squander, explaining what we do and how valuable our work is, to people who may never understand. The worst consequence of being in an undervalued field is when we begin to believe the naysayers. We doubt ourselves. We feel like imposters when others look to us for expertise. When the world’s values seem upside down, keeping our confidence right side up takes courage. For us to succeed, our esteem needs to come from the inside out, rather than the outside in.

Claiming our own brand of leadership Fortunately, small-minded prejudices are being challenged, and unproductive institu- tions are being toppled. Knowledge is evolving and disseminating more rapidly than a frog can leap. Scientific studies are debunking long-held beliefs. Deep-rooted definitions

What concerns me most these days are those people who think that we must (or even can) bypass feelings in order to develop the great national resource called children.

—Fred Rogers You Are Special

It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye.

—Antoine de Saint-Exupéry The Little Prince

18 Part I Forming

of intelligence and self-worth that have set the standard for more than a century are falling to new definitions. Scientists in burgeoning, brand-new scientific fields such as neurobiology and neuroendocrinology are conducting research that cannot be ignored. For early childhood leaders, one of the most liberating discoveries is something called “emotional intelligence.” Thanks to emotional intelligence research and prin- ciples, we early childhood professionals have upliftingly fresh:

• affirmations of the importance of our work,

• views of leadership,

• skill sets to improve our effectiveness,

• strategies to keep our heads when all about us are losing theirs and blaming us, and

• ways to keep our sense of humor and creativity at the forefront.

What is emotional intelligence, and how can it be so helpful? Let’s take a look.

What is emotional intelligence, or “EQ”? In a phrase, emotional intelligence (EQ) is the ability to read people as well as we read books, and to handle that information wisely. EQ is paying attention to the power of ev- erything that takes place beneath the surface of our words and behavior. Up to 93 per- cent of human emotion is communicated without one word being spoken (Borg 2008). If you have ever been given “the look,” you know the impact of unspoken communication. We cannot be in someone else’s presence without affecting that person’s physical and emotional state. Mastering how to read and wisely deal with these moment-to-moment, shifting dynamics and messages is what it means to be emotionally intelligent. Neuroscientist Louis Cozolino, in his seminal book The Neuroscience of Human Re- lationships, encourages us to realize that “even though we cherish the idea of individu- ality, we live with the paradox that we constantly regulate each other’s internal biologi- cal states” (2006, 3). He adds, “As a species, we are just waking up to the complexity of our own brains, to say nothing of how brains are linked together” (3). To be emotionally intelligent, leaders need to not only read the flurry of unspoken messages in steady transmission between people, but also practice savvy ways to communicate through these channels. To help us with this process, we will check out new research on how the adult brain works. But first, let’s get clear on the comparative definitions of intelligence, so we can distinguish EQ from the predominant definition of intelligence, IQ.

Defining EQ John D. Mayer and Peter Salovey (2004), pioneers in the field of emotional intelligence, define EQ (also referred to as EI) as the ability to:

• Perceive emotions accurately

• Appraise and express emotions

• Access and/or generate feelings when feelings facilitate thought

• Understand emotions and emotional knowledge

• Regulate emotions to promote emotional and intellectual growth (35)

Neuroscience has dis- covered that our brain’s very design makes it sociable, inexorably drawn into an intimate brain-to-brain linkup whenever we engage with another person. That neural bridge lets us affect the brain—and so the body—of everyone we interact with, just as they do us.

—Daniel Goleman Social Intelligence

19Chapter 2 Smart Heart-to-Heart Leadership

Howard Gardner (2011) includes “personal intelligence” in his multidimensional defini- tion of intelligence. Gardner incorporates both “intrapsychic capacities” and “interper- sonal skills” in his list of multiple intelligences. Reuven Bar-On, creator of the first standardized EQ test, provides the most common- sense definition of EQ: “Emotional intelligence is concerned with understanding oneself and others, relating to people, and adapting to and coping with the immediate sur- roundings to be more successful in dealing with environmental demands” (2004, 1). Psychologist and science journalist Daniel Goleman, who did much to bring the concept of EQ to the world’s attention, explains, “In a sense, we have two brains, two minds—and two different kinds of intelligence: rational and emotional. How we do in life is determined by both—it is not just IQ, but emotional intelligence that matters. Indeed, intellect cannot work its best without emotional intelligence” (2006a, 28). Before the emergence of the EQ concept, separation of head (intellect) from heart (emotion) was assumed to be essential. The common way of viewing intelligence was to value intellect unfettered by emotion. We now have evidence that without emotion, the intellect is limited and often ineffective.

Defining IQ The term IQ, or intelligence quotient, is a familiar one. Since the early twentieth century, IQ has been the accepted measurement of our capacity to think. IQ measures our abili- ties to:

• Combine and separate concepts.

• Judge and reason.

• Engage in abstract thought.

Think of a judge’s responsibility in a court of law: he or she articulates the law or legal standard, listens to the facts of the case, and reaches an objective decision by applying the law to the facts. The ancient Greek philosopher Socrates summed up the process in this way:

1. To hear courteously.

2. To answer wisely.

3. To consider soberly.

4. To decide impartially.

Impartial is the operative word. To be impartial is to be impersonal. Impersonal thinking is logical thinking unswayed by emotion. Without emotion, we have the purely rational. “Thinking with emotions” sounds like a contradiction in terms. It’s easier to prize pure logic and disdain emotion. Such was the case for centuries. IQ testing has been and continues to be the accepted way of measuring human intelligence. Most schools test students for IQ in high school, and sometimes earlier. The PSAT and SAT examinations for college admission are forms of IQ tests. The LSAT, a prerequisite for admission to law school, is another form of IQ test. “The old paradigm [of intelligence] held an ideal of reason freed of the pull of emo- tion,” notes Goleman (2006a, 29). This led to those who listened to their emotions being stereotyped as “bleeding hearts,” “wishy-washy,” “soft,” or “overly sensitive.” They were deemed to have “eggshell skulls,” because they might break down easily. Under the old paradigm, only the hard-headed, logical thinkers should be trusted with making major decisions.

Too little emotion can thwart or paralyze reasoning.

—Antonio DiMasio Descartes’ Error

20 Part I Forming

Comparing EQ and IQ EQ is IQ that takes feelings into account. “The new paradigm urges us to harmonize head and heart. To do that . . . we must first understand more exactly what it means to use emotion intelligently,” Goleman advises (2006a, 29). If ever there was a field that required us to “use emotion intelligently,” early childhood leadership is it. Neither intelligence is superior to the other. Historically, however, many of us have been labeled as intelligent or not based solely on our IQ scores. In everyday reality, IQ prepares us for academic tests; EQ prepares us for the tests of life. Interestingly, by some estimates, our IQ works in only 20 percent of the decisions we make (Goleman 2006a). The vast majority of our daily decisions and interactions requires EQ. A person with a high EQ is also a genius, albeit an unsung one. Consider the gifted practitioners you know in early childhood. Would you say their IQ scores are responsible for their gifts? What about their superior ability to make im- partial, logical choices? Or would you describe these gifted practitioners as being able to read people well and use that information wisely? Until EQ was identified and backed up by scientific studies, people with “people smarts” or “street smarts” were often looked down upon or considered inferior to those with “book smarts.” Today, that bias for IQ over EQ needs to be retired along with eight-track tapes and phonographs. Gifted practitioners need both EQ and IQ.

Scoring EQ: The Emotional Quotient Inventory Can EQ be measured? According to Reuven Bar-On, the answer is yes. According to Bar-On’s research (2007), his standardized test, the EQ-i® (Emotional Quotient Inven- tory, available at www.mhs.com), measures six components of emotional intelligence:

• Emotional self-awareness

• Assertiveness

• Empathy

• Interpersonal relationships

• Stress tolerance

• Impulse control

The test is self-reporting and requires the taker to describe him- or herself in a range of areas on a 5-point scale, from “Not true of me” (1) to “True of me” (5). I have both taken and been certified in administering the EQ-i® test. The results are highly in- formative and compelling, for leaders especially. And there’s more good news. Accord- ing to psychologist Steven Stein and psychiatrist Howard Book, “EQ can be accurately determined and effectively improved upon on an individual basis” (2011, 4). As leaders and practitioners, we continuously hone our people skills. Anyone who has valued and exercised IQ can also become a student of emotional intelligence. The prerequisite is humility. To be emotionally intelligent and arrogant is a contradiction in terms. (In Chapter 4, we will identify additional characteristics of effective leaders.) As we begin our study of how EQ can prepare us for situations that will test our leadership, let’s review first current neuroscientific research on the adult brain. Neuro- science is the study of how relationships affect every cell in the body and how the brain and the rest of the nervous system affect relationships.

21Chapter 2 Smart Heart-to-Heart Leadership

Respect the dignity, worth, and uniqueness of each individual (child, family member, and col- league).

—NAEYC Code of Ethical Conduct and

Statement of Commitment

The neurobiology of emotional intelligence Director Victoria in the chapter case study finds herself under fire. Leadership re- quires acting wisely under fire as well as in quiet, reflective times. As the core values in NAEYC’s Code of Ethical Conduct (2005) reflect, respect is the heart of professional- ism. Curiously, our biological makeup can work against our ability to act wisely, despite our best intentions. Recent research on brain functioning has identified factors in our neurobiology that both help and hinder us in acting professionally.

Biological mechanisms activated by threat We all know certain people who get under our skin. Like Roxie’s divisive behavior in the case study, some people’s actions offend what we hold dear. Since early times, human beings have been hardwired to respond without thinking to perceived threats (Cozolino 2006). Wolves, tigers, and fires were all threats to our forebears. Few of us today face real wolves, tigers, or raging fires on a daily basis. However, in metaphorical terms we do. Our brain still registers perceived threats with similar intensity. Feelings of aban- donment, shame, or humiliation can activate the same parts of our brain as a slap in the face does. Director Victoria expects to walk into just another weekly staff meeting until she overhears Roxie denigrate the NAEYC Accreditation process, to which Victoria is pas- sionately committed. Before Victoria can help herself, her face turns red and her jaw clenches. Let’s look at the physiological effect that Roxie’s “threat” has on Victoria. Thanks to the evolving field of social neuroscience, we now know more about what causes blow- ups and what we can do to prevent and ease out of them.

Amygdala: The reptile within Imagine peering inside your own brain. Deep in its center you would see four almond- shaped glands called the amygdala. The amygdala’s job is to keep us safe from harm by triggering the release of heart-pounding adrenaline from the adrenal glands above the kidneys into the bloodstream. Your heart beats faster, your blood pressure jumps, and your blood rushes into your muscles (away from your brain). That adrenaline rush, like a tidal wave, wipes out our thinking as it prepares our body for action. This is our fight- or-flight response. The amygdala is the hot button when your buttons get pushed by someone or something in your environment. It triggers us to protect and defend others and our- selves. If we see a 2-year-old about to chomp down on another child’s arm, we rush to separate the children. Researchers from the University of Southern California termed this the “tend-and-befriend response,” because individuals quickly circle the wagons to help one another in a crisis (Taylor et al. 2000). Whatever terminology you use to describe the amygdala’s effect, the result is the same—the impulse for instant, passionate action. In Cozolino’s words, “The amygdala works so fast that it can pair stimuli and a fear response far ahead of conscious aware- ness” (2006, 60).

Mirror neurons: How we catch each other’s feelings We also have nerve cells called mirror neurons that allow us, without thinking, to mimic the feelings and movements of people around us. To envision how mirror neurons work,

22 Part I Forming

picture a glittering school of fish darting and rising as one in perfectly synchronized motion. A biological force compels that perfection. Similarly, if you have felt the rippling exhilaration of a crowd at a sports event, you have experienced mirror neurons in action. For better or worse, mirror neurons can cause us to imitate the feelings and body movements of those around us. If you are upbeat at a staff meeting when everyone else is dour and negative, your optimism will likely be pulled down as you mirror the soggy mood. Similarly, if everyone is looking up at the sky, you will find yourself looking up. Mirror neurons can have positive or negative effects in group situations. They can contribute to a feeling of team spirit and joie de vivre or allow us to deeply empathize with others. But mirror neurons can also allow the corrosive negativity of a few to shred team morale. Amygdala hijack is Goleman’s term for times when our buttons get pushed and our body prepares to rush to action (2006a). If Victoria’s amygdala is hijacking her compo- sure, her employees’ mirror neurons are likely to pick up the intense, often frightening, feeling coming from her. What does this have to do with leadership? “In the interpersonal flow of emotion, power matters,” Goleman explains (2006, 24). Employees are hardwired to pay more attention to a leader’s messages than to a peer’s (unless that peer is the group’s de facto leader). Just as leaders can positively influence staff’s attitudes and actions, adult bullies can have a negative impact. A rampant gossiper, for example, wields considerable power to nonverbally broadcast her threat to others. People begin to think, “If she gossips to me, she will gossip about me.” The most powerful person in a group, with or without the leadership title, will have the greatest effect on team members’ mirror neurons. Mirror neurons are heavily responsible for a leader’s communication with his or her staff, too. Cozolino reminds us that “we greatly underestimate the degree of infor- mation we are communicating to those around us . . . and how much our unconscious processes, while invisible to us, are often apparent to others” (2006, 112). The effects of mirror neurons and the amygdala can be a blessing or bane. They can let staff members feel deeply the encouraging and visionary messages of their leader. This gives her power to promote positive change and soothe raw feelings. How- ever, if a leader loses control of her emotions (experiences an amygdala hijacking), her unleashed feelings may swiftly knock down staff morale. How can we avoid losing it?

Brain capacities that help restore sanity When my son Nick, at 2 years old, couldn’t persuade another child to let him play with a coveted toy, he sometimes resorted to biting. Nick’s teachers and I would intervene, saying, “Use your words, Nick.” As Nick’s brain matured, problem-solving capacities replaced impulsive reactions. We can count on diverse parts of our brain to restore our sanity, even under threat, as they did with Nick.

Calling on the executive function A useful development occurred in the evolution of the human brain. Slowly, the front, top area of our brain (prefrontal cortex) grew, and with it our capacity to back off and regain perspective in the midst of threats. These capacities such as planning, attend- ing, problem solving, inhibiting, and monitoring are called collectively our executive function. Although our amygdala can still override the executive function, our prefrontal

23Chapter 2 Smart Heart-to-Heart Leadership

cortex lets us take conscious steps to reactivate the calmer part of our brain, especially the part that controls decision making (orbitofrontal cortex, or OFC). Emotional intelligence, that ability to read people as well as we read books, can be called on to help us stay cool under pressure. Emotional intelligence helps us acknowl- edge and learn from our feelings. We need emotional intelligence to understand others and ourselves accurately. Rather than being ruled by unconscious biological forces, such as amygdala hijacks or mirror-neuron mimicry, we can hone our emotional intelligence to:

• Acknowledge and listen to our feelings: “What’s going on in my body right now?” or “What feelings am I picking up from others?”

• Accept that feelings offer useful information: “What are these sensations and feel- ings telling me?”

• Step to the side to regain perspective and identify options: “If my heart weren’t pounding, what might I do?”

IQ is often associated with the brain’s executive function. As mentioned earlier in this chapter, IQ was considered intellect untainted by emotion. Purely logical analysis was thought to be superior to the “muddled thinking” caused by feelings. Logical thinking is still critical; however, the executive function by itself is rarely enough. We need emotional intelligence to help us call on that executive function. The data from our emotions can significantly serve our rational analysis. Goleman (2010) suggests that 80 percent of major life decisions require EQ, not IQ. Thanks to our mirror neurons, we cannot hide our emotions from others, who can sense when we are discouraged, nervous, or happy. Our heartbeat communicates mes- sages to people within five feet via electromagnetic pulses (McCraty, Atkinson, & Brad- ley 2004). A quickened heartbeat may communicate “Welcome!” or “Back off!” Although we cannot stop our emotions from communicating, we can pay attention to several indicators of emotions, as outlined in the table How Do We Identify Emotions? In the introductory vignette, Victoria’s red face communicates her anger to the staff. Her sweating palms tell her she senses fear in the environment. In that moment, armed with valuable emotional information, Victoria can take a deep breath, pull her shoulders back, and call on her executive function for help. To envision executive function at work, picture a practitioner of tai chi, a martial art of self-defense. When an attacker strikes out, a tai chi master steps to the side. This causes the attacker to plunge off balance, deflecting the violent energy. Our emotional intelligence, like tai chi practice, allows us to step aside emotionally to stay out of harm’s way. Executive function allows us to stay cool. If you can recall a time when something that should have pushed your buttons didn’t, your prefrontal cortex was probably behind it.

Trusting intuition or our gut feeling Sometimes, when our amygdala puts the executive function out of commission, we need to rely on other parts of the brain. Fortunately, there are other brain capacities that allow us to act appropriately, especially in the face of danger. Journalist Malcolm Gladwell calls one of these intuitive processes “thin-slicing” (2005, 23). Thin-slicing oc- curs when we judge situations or individuals based on the thinnest slice of experience. Gladwell explains, “We thin-slice whenever we meet a new person or have to make sense of something quickly or encounter a novel situation. We thin-slice because we have the ability to, and we come to rely upon that ability” (2005, 44). Thin-slicing is not rare; it is “a central part of what it means to be human” (44).

24 Part I Forming

We have all heard of everyday people who act heroically, like the man who leapt like a gazelle to save an ailing person who had fallen onto New York City subway tracks. Or US Airways pilot Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger, who relied on thin-slicing to guide his aircraft to a safe landing in the Hudson River. Most of these heroes say simply, “I was just doing what anyone would have done.” Trusting our intuition, our gut decisions, in dangerous situations is reassuring. Gut decisions are far more than irrational acts; they use all our learning from prior difficult experiences. Each time we redirect a toddler from biting to another activity, we rely on our instinct to protect children from harm. Studies of brain activity do not show the OFC “lighting up” when we make gut deci- sions. Instead, three parts of the brain linked to emotion and intuition are activated to help us make such instantaneous, intuitive decisions:

• Insula: Is instrumental in emotional processing.

• Anterior cingulate cortex: Allows us to make decisions based on our experience with and assessment of prior outcomes.

• Superior temporal sulcus: Helps us anticipate other people’s thoughts and emo- tions by reading their, and our own, sensory stimuli, including what we see, hear, touch, and smell.

In a layperson’s terms, in making a gut decision, we heed the wise voice within. The executive function by itself cannot produce our best problem solving (Gilkey, Caceda,

How Do We Identify Emotions? Emotion Your Body’s Responses

Fear Dry mouth, sweaty palms, and difficulty swallowing; tense muscles, espe- cially at the back of the neck. (Picture a cat with its back arched.)

Anger Heat in the face, pounding heart, and surge of adrenaline energy; im- pulse to act immediately (“fight or flight”).

Sadness Lump in the throat, tightness in the chest, eyes “misting” or filling up with tears, loss of energy, pain around the heart. (Scientists have recently documented the “broken heart syndrome,” actual physiological changes that squeeze the heart muscles.)

Loneliness Coldness, yearning for touch/connection, aching heart. Isolation from others, feeling abandoned, rejected, left out.

Guilt Impulse to look down, away from people; need to shield or defend the body.

Shame Intense impulse to disappear or alternately the need to strike out against what/who caused the feeling of shame. Feelings of unworthiness, use- lessness, being undeserving. Feelings like guilt, but harder to shake.

Joy Light-heartedness, carefree feeling, uplifted confidence. Head held high, “walking tall,” feeling of breathing freely, ebulliency, “bubbling” energy. Sense that “all’s right with the world,” “attitude of gratitude.”

25Chapter 2 Smart Heart-to-Heart Leadership

& Kilts 2010). Paying attention to our gut responses and intuition leads to holistic, effec- tive decision making. Gladwell describes this work of the “adaptive unconscious” as “a kind of giant computer that quickly and quietly processes a lot of the data we need in order to keep functioning as human beings” (2005, 11). Rudyard Kipling called it keeping “your head when all about you are losing theirs and blaming it on you.”

How can I make wise decisions under pressure? Thanks to recent research in neuroscience, we now know we can call on both rational processes and gut instincts when we are under pressure. For example, recall a time when you stepped up to “do the right thing” regardless of fearsome pressures from within and without. What can we learn from colleagues and other experts about acting wisely under pressure?

Take a deep breath: Tune in to your rational self I have had the honor of interviewing early childhood leaders and other experts on Kipling’s question. Here are some of their insights on engaging healing parts of the brain when under pressure:

I check in with myself: Am I angry? Upset? Worried? I acknowledge those feelings as parts of myself. Then, I dialogue with those feelings: “I know you’re upset. How can I help?” (Bryan Robinson, podcast)

As we tell children, “You can be angry, but your actions don’t have to be done in anger.” (Debbie Sullivan, podcast)

Turn quacking ducks into eagles that soar above. Find out what’s going on: A lot of people have “stuff” in their lives. Tell them, “Talk to me. Why are you so against this?” Develop an action plan together that gets them involved. (Neila Connors, podcast)

Listen one time really well to capture their main point. Drill down on the main point. Redirect the person’s attention to problem solving. Ask, “What do you think we should do? What do you think I should do? I want to help you, but I need your help, too.” (Rick Kirschner, podcast)

Use humor: Emotional intelligence’s powerful partner Humor can lighten up the heaviest situation. When I laugh at myself, I stand a better chance of “getting over myself” in the moment. Stuart Brown advises, “When people are able to find that sense of play in their work, they become truly powerful figures” (2009, 154). Laughter and playfulness allow our reptilian amygdala, our purely logical OFC, and our thin-slicing ability to work in collaboration.

Bam!radio

“Overworked Educators: Dedicated, Fearful, or Addicted to Work?”

Interview with Bryan Robinson

Heart to Heart Conversations on Leadership

“Dealing with the Death of a School or School Program”

Interview with Debbie Sullivan

Heart to Heart Conversations on Leadership

“Teacher Negativity: Turning Naysayers into Hooraysayers”

Interview with Debra Viadero and Neila Connors

Heart to Heart Conversations on Leadership

“Dealing with People You Can’t Stand”

Interview with Rick Kirschner

Heart to Heart Conversations on Leadership

26 Part I Forming

Consider how Victoria could employ humor as she calls on all of her brain’s re- sources to deal professionally with Roxie’s affront:

Roxie’s undermining comment speeds at Victoria like a poisoned dart, but Victoria steps to the side and lets it go by. She pauses, breathes deeply, and firmly meeting Roxie’s gaze, she says, “It sounds like we need to have a frank discussion about classroom portfolios.”

Then, heaving a theatrical sigh, she continues: “You all know, I will never win the prize for most organized director” . . . the other teachers relax, and several give her a smile. “However, if I can pull off the organizational portfolio with your help, I believe we can work together so each of you can complete your classroom portfolio.”

“Trust me, faking it is not an option. Roxie, level with us. What’s your real issue with portfolios, and what do you need to get the job done?”

Intelligent early childhood leadership The next time your buttons get pushed, know that your brain has powerful capacities to help you act wisely. Cozolino says, “As we mature, our amygdala matures with us. It seems to be much more gentle with us and is much less activated by fear and anxiety” (podcast). Perhaps leaders have always sensed this. Early childhood leaders need a complex set of capacities to lead effectively. We need to read people and know what to do with that information. We need to logically and impartially assess software packages and construction bids, and maintain flawless budgets. We need to supervise staff (more to come on this in Chapter 9) with gentle- ness (reflective supervision) and resolution (directive supervision). We need to uphold quality in the best interests of children and families, while surviving deep funding cuts. And like the fearless spring robin buffeted by chilling winds in Elizabeth Spires’ poem, we need to have the faith “to sing to the flowers, not there yet.” This is all part of what we need to lead.

Last, but by no means least, courage—moral courage, the courage of one’s convictions, the courage to see things through. The world is in a constant conspiracy against the brave. It’s the age-old struggle—the roar of the crowd on the one side and the voice of your conscience on the other.

—Douglas MacArthur

Case Study—Lily When my daughter Lily was in preschool, she and I went to a birthday party for one of her friends. Lily looked adorable in her favorite polka-dotted bathing suit. Without warning, one of the fathers got right in my face: “What did you do to your daughter?” he exclaimed so loudly everyone turned to watch. I was so offended. I wanted to get right back in his face. Somehow, I paid attention to that quiet, sane voice within and said, “Thank you for your concern for my daughter. Lily is Korean. Some Korean children have Mongolian spots that look like bruises. Lily is not bruised. Her skin’s pigment on her back is black and blue for now. That will pass.” . . . And then I said something to lighten up the situation. People laughed and children went back to playing. My heart still pounded in my ears; however, I didn’t lose it. To this day, I recall the incident like a Technicolor video. Although I felt like yelling back, a gentler internal voice spoke. I listened. And that made all the difference.

Bam!radio

“Three Keys to Understanding People Who Push Your Buttons.”

Interview with Louis John Cozolino

Heart to Heart Conversations on Leadership

27Chapter 2 Smart Heart-to-Heart Leadership

Reflection questions 1. Looking back at your mentors, bosses, and teachers, describe the ones who showed

the greatest degree of emotional intelligence. What are some outstanding examples of ways they were smart heart-to-heart? What knowledge or life lessons have stayed with you as a result of your time with these people?

2. List five skills you believe an early childhood leader needs. Once you have written your list, go back over it and describe how emotional intelligence is or is not part of each skill.

3. Consider a time when your buttons got pushed. Who or what pushed your buttons? How did you respond? In retrospect and in light of the information in this chapter, what might you have done differently?

4. We all have shortcomings. Looking back at my story about freezing on the way up the Scottish gorge, have you faced any similar challenges brought on by your shortcom- ings? How much of leadership, in your opinion, is forgiving ourselves for not being perfect? Have you been successful at forgiving yourself? As Fred Rogers said, “The hardest thing is to forgive someone who has harmed us, especially if that person is ourself.”

Team projects 1. With the help of the How Do We Identify Emotions? chart (p.24), read the case study

that follows and answer the questions below:

Portia has a “soft spot in her heart” for children with special needs. Portia served as special needs teacher for eight years before she transitioned to the directorship. Sometimes she “takes over” in Inez’s classroom, which has a number of children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. Although Portia thinks she is helping her, Inez seethes from being “put down” and “edged out” by Portia. Portia often procrastinates in her other administrative responsibilities, such as placing orders for supplies and working on the budget. She says she “just loves those children.”

a. Describe the steps Inez can take to use her EQ to work through this challenge with Portia.

b. What are the possible emotional clues Portia is denying, both from Inez and within herself?

c. If Portia, feeling something might be wrong, turns to you for advice, what would you say to her? How do you think Portia can use her feelings as data? What steps do you recommend for Portia to take?

2. Interview child care directors about their successful experiences dealing with chal- lenging people: families, staff, or community members. First, create with your team a list of three to five questions you would like the directors to answer. Interview a director (each team member chooses a different director). Discuss with your team what each of you learned. Specifically, how did the directors use EQ to deal with their dilemmas?

3. Consider the concept of “genius.” How do you and your teammates define it? Can an early childhood leader be a genius? If so, how? Are there any early childhood profes- sionals you know who, in your experience, qualify as geniuses?

4. Leading in a profession with low pay, and some would say low status, can be daunt- ing. Share with your team members ways in which you have experienced our profes- sion being undervalued. Identify savvy strategies for:

28 Part I Forming

a. Directly addressing people with condescending attitudes. b. Dealing with your own feelings about being labeled “a glorified babysitter.” c. Ensuring that our field is professional.

Bibliography Borg, J. 2008. Body language: Seven easy lessons to master the silent language. Upper Saddle River,

NJ: Pearson Education. Bar-On, R. 2004. Emotional Quotient Inventory: Technical manual. Toronto, Ontario, Canada: Multi-

Health Systems. Brown, S. 2009. Play: How it shapes the brain, opens the imagination, and invigorates the soul. New

York: Penguin Group. Bruno, H.E. 2011. The neurobiology of emotional intelligence: Using our brain to stay cool under

pressure. Young Children 66 (1): 22–26. Cozolino, L. 2006. The neuroscience of human relationships: Attachment and the developing social

brain. New York: Norton. Gardner, H. 2011. Frames of mind: The theory of multiple intelligences. 3rd ed. New York: Basic

Books. Gilkey, R, R. Caceda, & C. Kilts. 2010. When emotional reasoning trumps IQ. Harvard Business

Review 88: 27. Gladwell, M. 2005. Blink: The power of thinking without thinking. New York: Little, Brown. Goleman, D. 1998. Working with emotional intelligence. New York: Bantam. Goleman, D. 2006. Social intelligence: The new science of human relationships. New York: Bantam

Dell. Goleman, D. 2010. Emotional intelligence: Why it can matter more than IQ. New York: Bantam. Mayer, J.D., & P. Salovey. 2004. What is emotional intelligence? In Emotional intelligence: Key read-

ings on the Mayer and Salovey model, eds. P. Salovey, M.A. Brackett, & J.D. Mayer, 29–60. Port Chester, NY: National Professional Resources.

McCraty, R., M. Atkinson, & R.T. Bradley. 2004. Electrophysiological evidence of intuition: Part 2. A system-wide process? The Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine 10 (2): 325–36.

NAEYC. 2011 [2005]. NAEYC Code of Ethical Conduct and statement of commitment. Position statement. Rev. ed. 2005, updated and reaffirmed 2011. Washington, DC: Author. Online at: www. naeyc.org.

Rogers, F. 2005. Life’s journeys according to Mister Rogers: Things to remember along the way. New York: Hyperion.

Stein, S.J., & H.E. Book. 2011. The EQ edge: Emotional intelligence and your success. 3rd ed. Missis- sauga, Ontario: Wiley.

Taylor, S.E., L.C. Klein, B.P. Lewis, T.L. Gruenewald, R.A.R. Gurung, & J.A. Updegraff. 2000. Bio- behavioral responses to stress in females: Tend-and-befriend, not fight-or-flight. Psychological Review 107 (3): 411–29.

Web resources Consortium for Research on EQ in Organizations

http://eiconsortium.org Directory of EQ Web Sites

http://eq.org Emotional Intelligence Information

www.unh.edu/emotional_intelligence EQ Online Test

www.queendom.com/tests/access_page/index.htm?idRegTest=1121 EQ-i® Emotional Quotient Inventory

www.mhs.com/product.aspx?gr=io&prod=eqi&id=overview Society for Neuroscience

http://apu.sfn.org

3 Making Tough Decisions: The Art and Science of Decision Making

Case Study—Magda Everyone knew it was coming; legislators had already cut education budgets way back. Director Magda thought she had faced the worst already. Breadwinners in more than half of the children’s families were laid off when local businesses relocated overseas. Magda had scrambled to tap into every possible resource to keep those workers’ children in her preschool. When the evening newscaster announced, “Legislators voted today to cut state voucher monies for child care slots; local preschools to close their doors,” Magda gasped. Next she heard the voice of Soledad, a director across town, speaking into the newscaster’s microphone, lament: “Last time they cut child care services to the bone. This time they cut through the bone. How can a parent without a job find a job if we can’t care for his children?”

When you combine your own intuition with sensitivity to other people’s feelings and moods, you may be close to the origins of valuable human attributes such as generosity, altruism, compas- sion, sympathy, and empathy.

—Fred Rogers, You Are Special

Determine what is most important in your life and make your deci- sions based on those very important criteria….truly become the creative force of your own life.

—Stephen Covey, The 8th Habit: From Effectiveness to Greatness

31

Magda knew she would have to choose which of her loyal teachers to lay off and which struggling families to terminate. With shoulders slumped and her guard down, she let the tears fall as she dialed Soledad’s home phone. If Magda and Soledad invite you to an emergency meeting to help with this crisis, with three months before the law takes effect, what ideas could you offer? Have you faced decisions

32 Part I Forming

where you “hit bottom” and could see no easy way out? What helps guide you through impossible choices?

Making tough decisions One of my staff members, a teacher with more years under his belt than I had at the time, confessed, “Hope springs eternal. But how many times can you get knocked down and get back up?” Leading through threadbare times is wrenching. To have confidence in our choices, we need insights into what makes a good, or good enough, decision. In Chapter 2, we looked at how to act wisely in the moment. In this chapter, we will take on decision making when you have the luxury (or bane) of time to reflect. I took the question “How do we make difficult decisions wisely?” on a quest as I interviewed experts, read research studies, and listened to colleagues. Here is what I found.

Cut yourself some slack When tackling the question “How do we make good, or good enough, decisions when stakes are high and the decisions are tough?” I discovered a new and simple guideline: cut yourself some slack. As we’ll see, the brain has a finite time each day—a window of opportunity—for making productive decisions that require a measure of self-control. We need to identify that “best time” and then, when our brain hits overload, rest or take on a repetitive task. We simply are not hardwired to handle a full day of continuous decision making, regardless of what the job may require. John Tierney (2011), in his New York Times article “Do You Suffer from Decision Fatigue?” reveals useful research on making tough decisions. Let’s examine how we can benefit from these discoveries.

Decision fatigue Tierney observes, after examining the research of Roy F. Baumeister (see Baumeister & Tierney 2011), that “the very act of making decisions depletes our ability to make them well” (Tierney 2011, 1). Baumeister’s research shows that during the day, the more decisions we make that require self-control, the less able we become to make decisions to resist other temptations as the day goes on. Can we monitor ourselves accurately enough to know when our brains are clicking well and when they have run out of steam? The challenge is in knowing our limitations. At what point in the day do we slip from being alert and self-controlled into mental exhaustion that stops us from making wise choices? As Tierney puts it, “No matter how rational and high-minded you try to be, you can’t make decision after decision without paying a biological price” (2011, 1). At some point, our willpower caves to temptation, and our decision-making process winds down to sloppy and careless. To understand the brain’s capacity to make wise decisions throughout the day, Jonathan Levav and Shai Danziger studied several judges’ parole decisions. They discovered that the chances of a prisoner being released did not depend on the merits of the case or “the men’s ethnic backgrounds, crimes or sentences” (Tierney 2011, 1). Instead, prisoners whose cases were heard by judges early in the morning received parole about 70 percent of the time. On the other extreme, prisoners whose cases were heard late in the day had a far lower likelihood of parole—less than 10 percent. Despite

33Chapter 3 Making Tough Decisions

the judges’ training or prowess, the prisoners’ “probability of being paroled fluctuated wildly throughout the day” (1). Decision fatigue is not the same as normal physical fatigue. We can be otherwise full of energy yet still mentally exhausted. We inevitably reach the point of having made so many decisions in a row that we become low on mental energy. The effect of making decision after decision is reckless decision making. Without intending to, we end up too mentally depleted to decide wisely. Our brains look for shortcuts. This is why a dieter can follow her diet rigorously all morning and even through dinner, but in the evening, when her brain is weary of decision making and self-control, the candy bar looks like a good choice. Have you ever been holiday shopping and felt like everything in the store looked good? That’s decision fatigue. Our ability to discern caves to our brain’s need to take a break from making dif- ficult decisions.

Ego depletion and decision making Decision fatigue is connected to a similar phenomenon that affects leaders’ capacity to continuously make their best decisions. That second phenomenon is known as “ego depletion” (Tierney 2011, 1). Ego depletion happens when we lose enough of ourselves to weariness that we commensurately lose our self-control. Humans have a “finite store of mental energy for exerting self-control” (2). Early childhood leaders need a deep store of self-control to see through a parent’s anger to her underlying sadness, or to keep the faith that a teacher who fears going back to college can complete one course at a time toward her degree. Once we are fatigued mentally, our sense of self is vulnerable to ego depletion— loss of willpower to continue doing the right thing. When ego depletion sneaks up, we become reluctant to negotiate. We settle for less than the best and become susceptible to self-indulgence. More candy bars, please.

Tips for making good decisions So, what is a decision maker to do? We have to make decisions, often one after another throughout the day. Berating ourselves for making a sloppy decision doesn’t help. Our brains can do only so much. According to a study led by Wilhelm Hofmann, human beings today resist tempta- tion three to four hours a day, during which time we are fit for making sound decisions (Tierney 2011). After that, “when the brain’s regulatory powers weaken, frustrations seem more irritating than usual. Impulses to eat, drink, spend and say stupid things feel more powerful (and alcohol causes self-control to decline further)” (7). How do we make tough decisions once that window of self-control and brain alertness passes? Baumeister and Tierney (2011) suggest the following practical pointers in their book Willpower: Rediscovering the Greatest Human Strength:

• Don’t schedule back-to-back meetings. Take some kind of a mental break even if only a brief one.

• Establish habits, like scheduled walks or workouts, to eliminate the mental effort of making choices.

• Keep your glucose levels up without relying on hollow calories like marshmallows or candy bars.

• Avoid temptations like all-you-can eat buffets and happy hours.

34 Part I Forming

Perhaps the best advice on how to consistently make difficult decisions comes from Baumeister at the close of Tierney’s article: “The best decision makers . . . are the ones who know when not to trust themselves” (2011, 7).

u EXERCISE YOUR EQ n  What indicators tell you when you ought to postpone making a decision? Can you sense when your brain has reached its limit for making wise decisions? What temptations (we all have them) can knock you off balance? What habits can you establish to eliminate ego depletion and decision fatigue?

Moving forward with impossible decisions Now that we know to take breaks from decision making—or else sacrifice our ability to make tough decisions wisely—we can beware of decision fatigue and ego depletion. How can we make wise decisions when facing another threat: impossible choices due to devastation of one sort or another? After the 2011 tsunami on the coast of Japan, Japanese leaders had to make impos- sible decisions. I asked international business consultant Mei Lin Fung and author Kimberly Wiefling for the secret of making impossible decisions in the worst possible

circumstances (podcast). Fung stressed, “Conflict is a tremendous opportunity to see what you may not have seen before.” Conflict and crisis may appear to be our adversaries, but when viewed differ- ently, they become our allies. In the jaws of the conflict, we see more clearly because our choices are limited. We cannot delude ourselves when the sky is falling on our heads or the tsunami is looming. Wiefling (podcast) added: When stuck making a decision, begin. When stuck again, keep going. See resistance as a kind of movement. In her experience, Wiefling has found these pointers valuable:

1. Language and thinking influence reality. Think in the language of possibility, not failure. What resources do we have, rather than what is lost forever?

2. Start in the future and think backward. Envision that the problem is resolved and what the world would look like then. Make decisions to help move toward that vision.

3. Ignore cynics who criticize you. Put them behind you and take your next step. “Many things seem impossible until they are done,” Wiefling stresses. Begin, keep going, and see resistance as a part of the path forward. Decide and get on with it.

Asking questions first Daniel Kahneman, Dan Lovallo, and Olivier Sibony (2011) offer a set of questions to ask ourselves to ensure that our decisions are our best. (These questions actually pertain to financial decisions but can be adapted to fit any kind of major decision.) They warn that dangerous biases can creep into every decision. Therefore, they urge us to conduct an audit of our motivation and preparation before coming to a conclusion with 12 steps. Here are three of those steps:

• Have I fallen so in love with my own idea that I can’t see the flaws? When assessing something we like, we are all prone to minimizing the risks and exaggerating the benefits.

• Have I been open to hearing dissenting opinions?

• Am I limiting my decision by being overly cautious? (Kahneman, Lovallo, & Sibony 2011)

Many things seem impossible until they are done.

—Kimberly Wiefling

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35Chapter 3 Making Tough Decisions

Looking back on Magda’s challenge in the chapter case study, which of the items on this checklist might help her? Consider the third question: Am I limiting my deci- sion by being overly cautious? Magda’s past experience of feeling she has exhausted all her resources may make her reluctant or cautious about trying anything new. Magda appears to be in the state described by Baumeister as “ego depletion” if not “decision fatigue.” She may even be ready to give up. Besides throwing in the towel, what choices does she have? Sometimes if we ask about or are at least open to new possibilities, we find help in unexpected places.

The anatomy of an impossible decision In response to Magda’s dilemma, the Ohio AEYC (OAEYC, the Ohio State NAEYC Affili- ate), under the leadership of Kimberly Tice-Colopy, created a solution that threw cau- tion to the wind. The state legislature had again taken its machete to early childhood funding, and providers were shaken. Rather than assume the worst and commiserate with one another, the OAEYC leadership team decided instead to bring all the best problem solvers in the state together. They called a summit on the topic “Making Dif- ficult Decisions in Difficult Times.” I was invited to facilitate the summit. The summit began with “just the facts”—that is, getting out on the table everything that was known about the changes. A high-ranking representative of the state education department shared everything she knew. She answered questions until everyone was up-to-date with the new legislation and its probable ramifications. We felt it was impor- tant for everyone to have all possible information. Next, we took time to grieve our losses by individually expressing feelings and thoughts. Participants formed small groups to share how each person and her program would likely be affected. Some participants were certain they would have to close their programs, putting out needy children and losing their livelihoods. Although compas- sion from colleagues couldn’t take away the pain, hurting people felt cared for and soothed. Feeling the support of a compassionate community bolsters our strength for decision making. Our working lunch was held in affinity groups. Single-site center directors, fam- ily providers, franchised programs, Head Start, multi-site programs, and research and referral agencies met separately to discuss how they could help one another and to formulate questions for the upcoming panel of experts. The panel had been carefully selected to represent both constituent groups and people who had successfully faced budget cuts. As panelists shared what had worked for them, participants chimed in with other suggestions. No one felt alone, and most everyone heard something valuable to take away. At the end, we affirmed our commitment to do all we could to bring quality care and education to all children, especially in the worst of times. The OAEYC team created a listserv to keep the discussion going. To this day, when participants from that summit get together, we hold the day in respect. Together, we did the best we could to face the daunting challenge. One outside-the-box decision by one dedicated AEYC Affiliate made all the difference. Consider whom you trust for help when you face a tough decision. With their sup- port, you are likely to find the decision-making process less burdensome.

The workshop gave mem- bers an opportunity to: • Develop a network of sup-

port and identify practical strategies to address the challenges;

• Learn from and engage in conversation with a variety of people with expertise in program management and finan- cial issues; and

• Partner with colleagues from across the state to strategize about the management of budget challenges.

—Kimberly Tice-Colopy “Investing in Members:

Ohio Redefines Its Purpose and Services”

36 Part I Forming

Admitting vulnerability in decision making Even in optimal times, we can make decisions we regret. Those decisions might be unwise or just plain wrong. Fear of making bad decisions can nibble away at our con- fidence. Second-guessing ourselves jams our brain with chattering static. Attacks of shame for failing to make the right call derail our courage. Because we will inevitably make disappointing decisions, we would do well to think ahead about how to clean up after a poor decision and how to use that experience to make better decisions in the future. As we continue our discussion of how to make tough decisions, let’s also look at how to handle decisions that go wrong. Another way to describe this part of the decision-making process is “damage control.”

u EXERCISE YOUR EQ n  Recall a time when you blew a decision. You just plain got it wrong, and people may have been adversely affected. Afterward, what internal conversation did you have with yourself? What did you decide to do to address your mistake? What did you learn from that experience?

How forgiving are people when leaders fail? Do leaders have the option of making mistakes and learning from them? Or does a “gotcha” mentality prevail, and because of that one strike against you, you’re out? Unlike movie stars, education leaders rarely gain instant forgiveness for checking into a rehabilitation facility. What can an apol- ogy by a leader accomplish, and what is the best way to apologize for mistakes? Most important, how can failing to make a good decision transform us into better decision makers?

How to apologize Barbara Kellerman (2006) spells out clear guidelines for making effective, compelling apologies. Authenticity is Kellerman’s standard. A leader has to mean what she says, learn from her mistakes, change her behavior for the better, and take action to remedy

the wrong for everyone harmed. Kellerman (podcast) explains that an effective apology for a poor decision embodies these actions:

• Acknowledge your mistake.

• Express responsibility; no pointing the finger elsewhere.

• Express regret and mean it.

• Time your apology to define the story rather than to be a forced or late reaction to criticism.

• Commit publicly to not making the same mistake again.

• Roll up your sleeves and take action to ensure the problem does not reoccur.

• Do all you can to restore the parties harmed to wholeness.

The benefits of apologizing far outweigh the costs, notes commentator Justin Snider (podcast). Thinking backward from the future, we might picture what we would say in our apology if we blow it when making a major decision. Heartfelt remorse goes a long way toward restoring trust.

When to apologize To decide if you need to apologize for a poor decision, Kellerman (podcast) suggests you ask:

1. What function would it serve?

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37Chapter 3 Making Tough Decisions

2. Who would benefit?

3. Why would it matter?

4. What might happen if you apologize?

5. What might happen if you decide not to apologize?

By schooling ourselves in how to apologize, we can set ourselves up to make better and better decisions by learning from and being accountable for our poorer decisions.

Learning from legal history By the time I had researched this input on making (and dealing with the fallout from) tough decisions, I decided I was experiencing decision fatigue, or at least information overload. At times like that, I find that stepping back to take the long view historically can help. Let’s consider the history of how tough decisions have been made.

Case Study—William Imagine yourself as a twelfth-century judge presiding over a court of law in the verdant, rolling countryside of feudal England. William, a tenant who rents his farm- land from a local lord, appears before you, asking that he and his family be permit- ted to stay on his property. The law says: Tenants who rent property from the landlord must pay their rent on time each season. Failure to pay on time will result in forfeiture of the land. Wil- liam’s rent is due on April 15. William paid his rent on April 20. What say you?

Twenty-first century early childhood professionals, like twelfth-century judges, are called upon to make decisions as often as they take a breath. Decision making is both an art and a science. Examining legal history (how judges have made decisions) can offer perspective on how to make “good enough” decisions. What constitutes a “fair” or “just” decision? As the story goes, the judge’s decision in William’s case was that William should “forfeit the property and quit the land.” William had failed to obey the law, and break- ing the law had a clearly articulated consequence—forfeiture. The judge did not take into account William’s personal circumstances. He used a logical, legal, and “scientific” approach. Would it matter that William had paid on time for five years and was responsible for a wife and 11 children? What if William had traveled night and day to find a bridge that was still standing after March floods had washed out other bridges William usually used to deliver his rent? The “letter of the law” does not concern itself with individual circumstances. In a letter of the law decision-making process, “the law is the law.” Fair- ness is demonstrated by applying the law the same way to every person.

Legal decisions or equitable decisions? Letter of the law decisions mete out evenhanded, often impersonal justice. Each person gets the same treatment under the law. “Spirit of the law” decisions, which take into account an individual’s circumstances, are called “equitable” decisions. Equitable decisions require viewing each person on a case-by-case basis as a unique individual.

38 Part I Forming

Making equitable decisions can be more of an art than a science. No one-size-fits-all template exists for spirit of the law decisions. While letter of the law (legal) decisions are expedient, spirit of the law (equitable) decisions require time and reflection. Similarly, legal decisions call more upon our IQ, while equitable decisions require us to use both EQ and IQ. Discerning which type of decision-making process is more appropriate calls for a leader’s intellectual savvy and skillful ability to perceive nonverbal messages. We make both types of decisions by grounding ourselves in the deeper goal—doing what is best for children and families. Spirit of the law decisions may be more appropriate and humane than invoking the letter of the law. When you make a spirit of the law decision, you take into account the totality of the individual’s circumstances. You look more deeply to find the root cause of the problem, to make a decision tailored to best deal with each person’s situation. Think how efficient your work would be if you could make all your decisions like a twelfth-century judge. William was out the door, without recourse. As emotionally intel- ligent twenty-first century professionals, we devote hours to accommodating individual needs. Is there a “middle path” between law and equity? Can equitable decisions take less time? Come back to the twelfth century with me to find some answers.

Recourse for questionable decisions In London, the Chancery Court (later called the Court of Equity) was a place where controversial cases like William’s could be appealed. There, the ecclesiastical member of the king’s cabinet, appointed to represent the Church, decided cases using the spirit of the law. The Chancery Court was also called the Star Chamber, because the ceiling paint was resplendent with stars. Under those stars, the Lord Chancellor, or Chancel- lor of Equity, overturned the decision of the law court (lower court) and returned the property to William for having made a “good faith effort” (traveling night and day) in the face of an “act of God” (springtime flooding). As the Chancellor of Equity acted on William’s claim, he used an artful decision-making process, drawing from an alternative definition of fairness. The spirit of the law became legitimized as an official decision- making process.

Decision-making processes Decision making by spirit of the law Maxims created in the Chancery Court, such as “making a good-faith effort,” are still in common parlance today. Equitable principles evolving from the Chancery Court include:

3  Equity will not allow a wrong to be without a remedy.

3  Equity regards substance rather than form.

3  One who seeks equity must do equity.

3  Equity acts in personam (takes into account the individual’s circumstances).

3  Equity delights to do justice, and not by halves.

William and countless others over the centuries have benefited from this “softer” decision-making process. In the swirl of twenty-first century complexity, early childhood leaders stand as if holding the scales of justice, seeking to balance what is equitable with what is just.

39Chapter 3 Making Tough Decisions

Often we feel blindfolded, unclear on the standards to use and troubled by the thought of unforeseen consequences. We may yearn to be back in the day when decision making was simpler. When the law was the law. In fact, things were never simpler, nor were they ever so difficult. We often must weigh two competing realities: Fairness means taking individual circumstances into account while also upholding professional standards. In some situations, the objective, analytical decision-making process is appropriate. In other situations, the compassion- ate, individualized process is more fitting. How can we tell the difference?

Decision making by weighing the pros and cons Letter of the law decisions are made by weighing the benefits and detriments (pros and cons) of each option. Traditionally, decisions were made using a process that involved:

1. Listing the pros and cons of the situation objectively.

2. Analyzing the list: Which side has the more substantial factors?

3. Making a logical decision in favor of the weightier side.

At times, this process works well. Administrators pressed by an onslaught of deci- sions to be made find the objective approach useful. When a leader makes an impartial decision, he can decide quickly. He does not have to consider the complexity of human emotion. The leader bases his decision on established policies and procedures, and in following precedent or upholding tradition, he furthers predictability and stability. Expectations are met with consistency. More often than not, however, a director’s impartial decision will be challenged. The administrator may hear complaints that she failed to ask everyone’s opinion before deciding or did not notify staff about an impending change. Letter of the law decisions often meet with resistance if social intelligence savvy is not part of the decision-making process. Consider the following example.

Preschool teacher Joanne decided to tell Aliesha’s mom that her daughter needed an evaluation for learn- ing disabilities. Joanne had painstakingly documented all of Aliesha’s behaviors warranting an evaluation. Joanne found very few “cons” in her decision: All factors pointed to Aliesha’s needing help.

When Joanne shared her rational decision with Aliesha’s mom, Joanne was stunned that her decision was immediately rejected. “Aliesha never behaves like that at home! You must be upsetting her!” the distressed parent cried. Joanne’s decision was purely rational and emotionally blind. She did not use her EQ to discover and understand the parent’s way of looking at her world—especially the parent’s feelings about Aliesha.

In the future, Joanne will pay more attention to building a relationship with parents while continuously shar- ing information with them. Joanne will practice putting herself in parents’ shoes to gain empathy for their situation.

Partnering with family members like Aliesha’s mom is not just a science, but also an art. Parents’ feelings of pride, fear, denial, outrage, and shame all need to be factored into a teacher’s decision about how best to help the child and the family. A leader needs to develop skill at both types of decision making and, even more important, at discerning when to use each type. Cut-and-dried decisions that do not directly affect people are often best determined by using the letter of the law process. For decisions that touch people directly, a leader will likely do better to use the spirit of the law approach. Both approaches require EQ and IQ—they require us to read people. Neither decision-making process is superior to the other. Myers-Briggs (MBTI) per- sonality type data (in Chapter 4) help us understand why staff and others have strong

40 Part I Forming

feelings about which process to use. People who are (Feelers) tend to expect individual- ized treatment. They are more likely to identify fairness with compassion. Those who are (Thinkers) tend to expect consistency and are not as bothered by making imperson- al decisions. Leaders who call upon their knowledge of MBTI preferences will be better able to foresee the consequences of the decision-making style they choose.

u EXERCISE YOUR EQ n  Recall one of your recent decisions. Was that decision a letter or spirit of the law choice? Do you lean one way more often than the other when you make decisions? Do you see limitations to either process? What is your personal standard for using one decision-making process over another? Let’s look at some other decision-making processes.

Decision making by intuition (thin-slicing) New research on decision making invites us to take a twenty-first century approach to this age-old dilemma. Malcolm Gladwell, in his book Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking (2005), states that our best decisions are made intuitively, in the “blink of an eye.” According to Gladwell, rumination, or going back and forth second-guessing ourselves, can be counterproductive. Instinctively, we know what needs to be done. Our job is to trust our intuition and take action without dilly-dallying. As discussed in Chapter 2, Gladwell calls this decision-making process “thin- slicing.” We thin-slice when our “brain reaches conclusions without immediately telling us that it’s reaching conclusions” (2005, 10). The part of our brain that thin-slices is the “adaptive unconscious . . . a kind of giant computer that quickly and quietly processes a lot of the data we need in order to keep functioning as human beings” (11). Thin-slicing is the act of listening to our inner voice over the cacophony of self-doubt. How do you discern the sound of your inner voice over the thunder of other voic- es? Gladwell says we can “teach ourselves to make better snap judgments” (2005, 16).

Decision making by “gifted improvisation” In addition to the problem of second-guessing, thin-slicing raises another red flag— prejudice. For thin-slicing to work well, a decision maker needs a richly developed inner landscape. An inner landscape is the sum of our life experience and decisions to date. Our inner landscapes grow lush when nourished by our interactions with people who differ from us, and by taking risks to grow. Otherwise, we tend to see the world in our own image, expecting others to hold similar values and perspectives. An accurate word for this is solipsism, the false belief that we are the center of the universe. To let go of solipsistic, biased attitudes, we need thoughtful and heartfelt openness and exposure to diverse people, cultures, and environments. Nourishing our inner landscape is a lifelong process. At Harvard University, doc- toral students were asked to participate in a study that required them to thin-slice. Each student was shown photographs and asked for an immediate response to each image. These students, both black and white, consistently indicated their preference for images of white people. The students were stunned when told the results. What if our immediate world is not large enough to embrace, witness, and experi- ence others’ cultures? What do we do when the larger world, as evidenced in the Har- vard study, holds covert as well as overt bias? Our thin-slicing capacity is limited by the boundaries of our experience and the barrage of unstated messages.

When I hear I see, when I see I hear.

—Zen koan (parable)

Thin-slicing is not an exotic gift. It is a central part of what it means to be human. We thin-slice whenever we meet a new person or have to make sense of something quickly or encounter a novel situation. We thin-slice because we have to, and we [have] come to rely on that ability.

—Malcolm Gladwell Blink: The Power of

Thinking Without Thinking

41Chapter 3 Making Tough Decisions

Gladwell presents a refreshing recommendation for moving beyond this type of bias. He invites us to look beyond our own profession to another profession—impro- visational theater. Gladwell studied the ground rules for successful improvisation, or “improv.” Improv, he discovered, works only when each actor builds on the previous statement of his or her fellow actor, no matter how absurd that statement appears to be. If the second actor criticizes the first actor’s statement, the moment is lost. How- ever, if the improviser finds a creative way to “run with” the statement, magic happens. Energy builds, the audience is engaged, and innovation occurs. Life problems are worked through with humor and originality. The next time you have the opportunity to experience improvisational theater or television, observe in action the principle of building on another’s statements. To support this principle, Gladwell quotes improv expert Keith Johnstone. “In life, most of us are highly skilled at suppressing action. All the improvisation teacher has to do is to reverse this skill and he creates very ‘gifted’ improvisers. Bad improvisers block action, often with a high degree of skill. Good improvisers develop action” (2005, 114–15). In the blink of an eye, we can find value in what is being offered, or we can turn away and lose the opportunity. Consider the ramifications of this improv principle for our profession. When a Hmong father describes his practice of healing his child’s chest coughs through “coin- ing”—quickly running hot coins in a line down a person’s back—what is our response? Do we greet the moment with wonder or judgment? If we judge the parent, we lose the opportunity to learn about Hmong culture, the family, and the child. If we build on the moment, trust and knowledge are shared. To grow away from bias as a decision maker, leaders can explore and build on dif- ferences rather than deny them. Janet Gonzalez-Mena (2001) recommends, “Be a risk taker. If you are secure enough, you may feel you can afford to make mistakes. It helps to have a good support system behind you when you take risks and make mistakes. Ask questions, investigate assumptions, confess your curiosity—but do it all as respectfully as possible” (42–43). Early childhood professionals are skilled at improv. “Multitasking” is our middle name. Each time a teacher practices the emergent curriculum approach, she impro- vises by building on the potential of the moment. Children respond with fascination and hunger to learn more. The teachable or learning moment is captured. As a director listens to the meaning beneath the words of a parent, the director may abandon one pathway of working with that parent and spontaneously start down another, better suited path. To improvise better decisions like this, we benefit from getting out there in the world more and exposing ourselves to things we do not know, to the people we have avoided, to the life experience we have yet to live. In the process, as we deepen our experience and shine light on our blind spots, we find the conviction of our inner voice. We achieve at last that richly developed inner landscape. As early childhood professionals, we resolutely encourage children to value them- selves and trust their own unique worth. What if we practice what we tell our children? Gavin de Becker (1997), a security specialist, counseled: “We have the gift of a brilliant internal guardian that stands ready to warn you of hazards and guide you through risky situations” (13). Develop trust in yourself as a leader. Accept that you are a good enough decision maker. Perhaps, by thin-slicing, the spirit and letter of the law can join hands at last.

42 Part I Forming

Dealing with self-doubt When making decisions, ruminating too long or second-guessing ourselves about how others will perceive us can detract from our ability to take action. We worry, “What if I’m wrong? What if people misunderstand my intention? What if someone’s feelings get hurt?” Ruminating like this wastes time, and worrying devours confidence. While some questioning is productive, too much second-guessing harms our capacity for decision making. Staff will wonder whether such a director can make decisions. Gladwell cau- tions, “I think that approach [requiring extensive documentation] is a mistake, and if we are to learn to improve the quality of the decisions we make, we need to accept the mysterious nature of our snap judgments” (2005, 52). How do we step out of the trap of debilitating self-doubt? An answer lies in positive self-talk. When repetitive, worrisome voices impede your decision-making ability, quiet down those negative voices with words of self-confidence.

u EXERCISE YOUR EQ n  Each of us can develop our own phrases or affirmations to repeat when we find ourselves slipping into second-guessing. Reflect on situations that erode your confidence, and then say these affirmations aloud:

• Every decision is the right decision, because I learn from each one. • I make snap decisions with children, and my judgments are good. I can do the same

with adults. • “Once you make a decision, the universe conspires to make it happen.” (Ralph

Waldo Emerson) • What other people think of me is none of my business.

Create your own positive affirmation: __________________________________________. Positive self-talk replaces self-doubt with faith in our ability to make “good enough” decisions. Second-guessing is a rut, a well-established brain pathway. Positive self-talk, with regular practice, helps us climb out of that rut. You can build new brain connec- tions when you remind yourself, “I am a good enough decision maker.” Do your best for today and move on. Here are tips directors recommend:

1. Set a firm deadline for making the decision. Honor that deadline and move on.

2. Sleep on it. Make a tentative decision by the end of the workday. Sleep on that deci- sion overnight. You are likely to wake up resolved in your decision.

3. Stop second-guessing by choosing to thin-slice your decision in the moment. Write down your snap decision. Walk away and get involved with something else. Come back later to read what you wrote. You may find your decision has been made.

The right or good enough decision is often already inside us. This process of defus- ing self-doubt helps directors cut to the chase to uncover that decision. Leaders have many opportunities to replace worry with positive self-talk. Many directors find they need to let go of the impossible or perfectionist standard they set for themselves—the standard to make infallible decisions that will never be questioned. Good enough deci- sions allow us to move on to the next challenge that awaits us.

Involving others in the decision-making process In studying how leaders make decisions, we need also to look at involving others in making important choices.

I am perfectly imperfect. —Pia Mellody

43Chapter 3 Making Tough Decisions

Mine, ours, yours Early childhood leaders work within a community of stakeholders. Stakeholders are people who have an interest, or stake, in the outcome of a decision. Teachers, parents, board members, cooks, and bus drivers can all be stakeholders in early childhood pro- grams. People whose lives are affected by a decision expect to be consulted before that decision is reached. Stakeholders demand “due process” (discussed later, in Chapter 7), the right to speak up and have their opinion taken into account. For this reason, effective directors need to level up front with staff about who will make the decision. Before a director makes a decision, he needs to determine: Will this decision be mine, ours together, or yours to make? A leader who sets clear expectations about who has the authority to make decisions prevents many misunderstandings. Decisions that involve groups of people fall into three categories: mine, ours, and yours. To set clear expectations about who has the authority to make decisions in each situation, inform everyone about which group or person that is. Here are some sugges- tions for letting staff know whose responsibility a decision is.

Mine:

• This decision is my responsibility. I’ll let you know as soon as I come to a decision.

• I would appreciate your input before I make my decision.

• Give me a list of your top three suggestions. I will take those into account as I make my decision.

Ours:

• This decision is ours to make as a team. Let’s come to a consensus. We’ll start by going around the circle to hear how everyone feels.

• We all will have an equal vote in this decision. Would you prefer a show of hands or a written ballot?

Yours:

• You can decide how you want to handle this situation. I will back you up.

• Your team will be the final decision maker on this question. Let me know what you decide.

u EXERCISE YOUR EQ n  Think of a decision you are currently facing that involves other people. Which of these three categories best describes who will make the deci- sion? Do you think everyone is clear on who has the authority to make this decision?

Making group decisions Staff members are more likely to feel responsible for carrying out decisions they have taken part in making. Just as individuals need to understand their personal decision- making process, teams need to be clear on the group decision-making process. Teams reach decisions by one of two methods—consensus or majority vote. Leaders will want to ensure that everyone understands which process will be used. Groups reach consensus when they come to a meeting of the minds about what action to take. The group gels and is ready to act as one, needing no further debate. With a consensus, no vote is necessary. A consensus is best reached after everyone has spoken on the issue. Before reaching consensus, make sure that concerns and doubts are voiced and resolved. Use your EQ to sense when the group is ready to reach a

Due process is guaranteed by the 14th Amendment of the United States Constitu- tion. Due process consists of giving stakeholders:

1. Notice of a possible change that will affect their rights, and

2. Opportunity to be heard, to speak their minds about the proposed change.

When an administrator fails to give her staff due process, she can expect resistance. “You never told us about that!”

44 Part I Forming

consensus. Rushing a consensus can result in a lukewarm commitment or sabotage the decision. Voting on an issue allows the majority to decide for the whole team. This can lead to a disgruntled minority. For this reason, decision making by consensus is usually more unifying. However, if your team’s maturity level is high, voting can work. Those who lose the vote “let go,” move on, and support the outcome. Make sure again that ev- eryone who participated in the vote agrees to support the decision. Ask: “Does anyone anticipate a problem carrying out this decision? If so, let’s talk that over before we leave the room. We all need to be on the same page.”

Decision-making structures Your decision-making style predicts how you will structure your organization. Directors “structure” their programs internally to let every employee know where she or he be- longs in the organization by knowing how decisions will be made that affect them. The clearer the expectations, the fewer the power struggles. Power struggles often come about because decision-making authority is ambiguous. The structure you choose indicates your chain of command. In a chain of com- mand, each person is a link in the chain of decision making. Each teacher knows her supervisor. She also knows to whom her supervisor reports. This chain of command tells us who is responsible for what decision. An organization’s chain of command clarifies who reports to whom. A “floating” teacher especially needs to know to whom she reports. Every teacher wants to know who will perform her annual evaluation. The personnel committee of a board is ap- pointed by and responsible to the board chair. A clear chain of command provides security and predictability on who will make important decisions. With a clear chain of command, a leader has choices about the organizational structure she wants to use. Three types of organizational structures are:

1. Hierarchy

2. Flat structure

3. Hybrid (combination of hierarchy and flat).

u EXERCISE YOUR EQ n  As you study each of these structures, pay attention to your response to each one. Do you find you have a preference for one form over another?

Hierarchy Directors who make decisions by themselves tend toward “top-down” structures, or hierarchies. In a hierarchy, the chain of command begins with the director at the top, and every other employee reports to the director in some way. In a hierarchy, the person at the top of the organization makes the important decisions. A military general issues a command, which everyone must follow.

Flat In flat organizations, teams make decisions. Juries, Quaker meetings, and 12-step groups are examples of flat organizations. Flat structures rely on building consensus among team members. Participation and ownership of decisions are highest in flat structures.

45Chapter 3 Making Tough Decisions

Hybrid In hybrid organizations, the leader makes some decisions and teams make other deci- sions. For example, directors make budget decisions (hierarchical), and teams decide how to plan activities that involve parents (flat).

u EXERCISE YOUR EQ n  What is your perception of how decisions are made in your organization? Draw a representation or chart of how your program would look to an outsider.

Use circles to represent a team that makes decisions. Draw a vertical line from the top of each team’s circle to the person to whom the team reports. Write the position and name of the decision maker at the top of each vertical line. For example, draw a circle for the infant/toddler teaching team. Next, make a vertical line upward from that circle. At the top of the line, create a box with the relevant supervisor’s title or name. Continue doing this until every individual and team is included in the representation. Once you have drawn your representation of how decisions are made in your organization, compare it to your program’s organization chart, or “org chart.” These charts are often required for grant applications. Each director should have an org chart available for you to view. Is your drawing in line with the official chart? Differences in perception can lead to lively, informative discussions.

The dynamics of decision making in hierarchies, flat organizations, and hybrids Hierarchies: Decision making by Tops, Middles, and Bottoms In hierarchies, the top-down decision-making process has a strong effect on morale. Middles and Bottoms may feel insecure and slighted because the director can hire and fire staff at will. Lower-level staff members sometimes have little loyalty to the organiza- tion. They see themselves as working for the children and the paycheck. Only a charis- matic leader, or an engaging mission, can inspire loyalty to a hierarchy. Authoritarian structures like hierarchies have strengths and weaknesses. Strengths include expedient decision making, a clear chain of command, and role clarity. Deficien- cies can include rigidity; stagnation; and restricted, top-down communication. Management consultant Barry Oshry (1986) describes the predictable dynamics in hierarchies. Oshry labels employees in hierarchical organizations as Tops, Middles, and Bottoms.

Tops The executive decision maker, or Top, wields a great deal of power. Tops (owner, director/ owner, director, or board) make decisions with little input. Tops often take a letter of the law approach. Due process, taking time to get employees’ input, slows down a Top. According to Oshry, Tops are perceived as “numbers-oriented, distant, arbitrary, out-of-touch, and thinking of people as things not as people” (1986, 21). Tops appear to be dedicated to their own interests, rather than the interests of others in the organization.

Middles Middles (assistant directors, site directors, and curriculum coordinators) report to Tops. Middles are limited in the decisions they can make. The job of the Middle is to negotiate between the Top and the Bottoms of the organization. If you have ever felt

46 Part I Forming

“stuck in the middle,” you know what a middle manager’s position feels like. Others see Middles as diligent, responsible, well-intended, but also turncoats, weak and unable to make decisions that stick (Oshry 1986). Decisions made by Middles are often tentative, pending approval from above. A middle manager says, “I’ll have to get back to you on that” or “I’ll see what I can do.”

Bottoms Bottoms (teachers, teacher’s aides, bus drivers, and family support workers) feel least empowered to make meaningful decisions. Bottoms unhappily label themselves as “pawns,” “peons,” and “worker bees” at the mercy of those in power. Tops are not re- quired to pay attention to what Bottoms want or need. Bottoms’ decision-making power is to strike or quit. Bottoms can drop everything and walk out the door. Frustrated Bottoms resist authority by saying, “That’s not in my job description; you don’t pay me to do that.”

Flat structures and decision making In flat structures, everyone takes part in decision making. The director knows every- one, and everyone has access to the director. Employees are maximally involved. Everyone is kept informed. Pathways are in place for transmitting information rapidly to everyone in the organization. Due process is at the heart of flat structures. Lead- ers rarely act unless everyone has been informed and has spoken on each issue. Early childhood organizations almost always include some form of flat, or team, structure. Flat structures, like hierarchies, have endured through the ages. The Native Ameri- can process of using a “talking stick” ensures that everyone has the right to speak. Juries sit around a table together for as long as it takes to reach often heart-wrenching decisions. Our legal system assumes that a jury’s flat structure ensures that the “voice of the people” will be heard. Early childhood organizations are imbued with flat structures. Parent advisory committees, team teachers, and other collaborative efforts are often the preferred mode for making decisions. Flat structure strengths include a high level of staff commit- ment, ownership, empowerment, and involvement. Flat structures present challenges, however, especially to those who grew up in hierarchical systems. Decisions made by consensus require that each team member be mature and accountable. Without maturity, individuals in flat structures can slide into power struggles, manipulating others into following their lead. Unlike hierarchies, in flat structures, jobs may not be clear. The chain of command can be foggy. Decision making by teams often takes more time than anyone has. Directors are likely to hear the cry, “Not another meeting!”

Hybrid approach to decision making As you may have imagined, few organizations are purely hierarchical or purely flat. Most early childhood leaders institute team decision making. Directors who want to de- velop future leaders encourage employees to make decisions for themselves. Reflective supervision (discussed in Chapter 9) is an example of hybrid decision making. Employ- ees are mentored to become more confident and competent in making daily decisions. The supervisor retains the authority to evaluate the staff member. Team teaching is another example of a hybrid decision-making structure. Both teachers have an equal voice in how the classroom will function. Aides and assistants

47Chapter 3 Making Tough Decisions

are encouraged to share their views. Even lead teachers often act as just another voice in the classroom decision-making process. Nonetheless, each teacher is ultimately responsible to the director. Directors decide whether to retain or terminate employees. Who would want a committee to perform his brain surgery? Surely, we want one competent person in charge. Similarly, most directors would not want to change the staff handbook without listening to teachers’ ideas and feelings first. Crystal clear, no questions asked, emergency evacuation plans are essential. However, without staff input in developing the plan, that plan is less familiar.

The buck stops here Directors have the opportunity to decide how much decision making to share and how much to retain. As a leader, regardless of the decision-making approach you choose, re- member to inform your staff if the decision is mine, ours, or yours. Staff will thank you, and the program will run more smoothly. How we make decisions affects the morale, efficiency, and structure of our pro- grams. Now that you know your options, what works best for you? Are you more likely to make letter of the law or spirit of the law decisions? Would you weigh the pros and cons of each choice before making a decision? Or are you more at ease thin-slicing, call- ing upon your intuition? Many administrators are most comfortable using a combina- tion of these approaches, depending on the situation. The choice is yours. Along the way, remember that leaders can suffer from decision fatigue. Give your- self a break from decision making when you can. That act of kindness to yourself will clear the fog and make your next decision-making marathon more powerful.

Reflection questions 1. Complete the organizational chart for your program, as discussed on page 44. Would

you say your organization is hierarchical, flat, or a hybrid? Is the chain of command clear? Do you see yourself as a Top, Middle, or Bottom in that structure? If you were to change one thing about your organizational structure, what change would you make? What effect would this have on your program? Include your org chart and reflections in a paper on these questions.

2. Reflect on an important decision you have made. For example, how did you decide where to go for your schooling, how to resolve a recent conflict, or who would be your closest friend? Which of these decisions did you make by using the letter of the law (pros and cons) process, and which did you decide by the spirit of the law approach? Do you see a pattern emerging in your decision-making preference? Are letter of the law or spirit of the law decisions more successful with young children?

3. Describe in an oral presentation or in writing what you have learned about yourself. How comfortable are you with thin-slicing your decisions? Give an example of a deci- sion you thin-sliced successfully and a thin-sliced decision that was not so success- fully. Gladwell suggests that we get better at thin-slicing the more we expose our- selves to the unfamiliar and unknown. Write a list of steps you might take to deepen your experience and your ability to thin-slice. Be as concrete as you can.

48 Part I Forming

Team projects 1. Compare your organizational chart with those of your teammates. What decision-

making structures do early childhood organizations appear to have in common? Research and share at least one article apiece on what makes early childhood teams effective. What three changes would you make to ensure that team decisions are made effectively in your organization?

2. Morale can be enhanced or harmed by the degree and quality of staff involvement in decision making. Discuss which decisions should be “mine” (the director’s and/or administrator’s), “ours,” or “yours” in early childhood programs. Are staff members in your programs clear about who has responsibility for each decision? Does your program include Tops, Middles, and Bottoms? If so, how does that structure affect morale? As a group, identify three ways morale in your program could be uplifted by making changes in the decision-making process. Lead small group discussions with colleagues on this topic.

3. Find a local improv group or performance, or view one online or on television. One example of an improv television show is Whose Line Is It Anyway? Attend or watch the improv performance together. Meet afterward to share your observations in the light of improv theory discussed in the chapter. Finally, practice doing improv within your team by quickly adding on to what another person has said. Record or video highlights of your team’s efforts in learning about the relevance of improv to our daily decision making in early childhood.

Bibliography Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990, as Amended, 42 U.S.C. 12101 et seq (2008). Baumeister, R.F., & J. Tierney. 2011. Willpower: Rediscovering the greatest human strength. New

York: Penguin. Bruno, H.E., & M.L. Copeland. 1999. Decisions! Decisions! Decision-making structures which sup-

port quality. Leadership Quest (Spring). Bruno, H.E., & M.L. Copeland. 1999. If the director isn’t direct, can the team have direction? Lead-

ership Quest (Fall). Buchanan, L., & A. O’Connell. 2006. A brief history of decision making. Harvard Business Review 84

(1): 32–41, 132. de Becker, G. 1997. The gift of fear: And other survival signals that protect us from violence. New

York: Dell. Dobbs, D.B. 1993. Law of remedies. 2nd ed. St. Paul, MN: West Publishing. Gladwell, M. 2005. Blink: The power of thinking without thinking. 2nd ed. New York: Little, Brown. Goleman, D. 2010. Emotional intelligence: Why it can matter more than IQ. New York: Bantam. Gonzalez-Mena, J. 2001. Multicultural issues in child care. 3rd ed. New York: McGraw-Hill. Greenspon, T.S. 2002. Freeing our families from perfectionism. Minneapolis, MN: Free Spirit

Publishing. Kahneman, D., D. Lovallo, & O. Sibony. 2011. The big idea: Before you make that big decision …

Harvard Business Review 89 (6): 50–60, 137. www.hbr.org/2011/06/the-big-idea-before-you-make- that-big-decision/ar/9

Kellerman, B. 2006. When should a leader apologize—And when not? Harvard Business Review 84 (4): 72–81, 148.

Oshry, B. 1986. The possibilities of organization. Boston: Power & Systems. Senge, P.M. 2006. The fifth discipline: The art and practice of the learning organization. Rev. ed. New

York: Doubleday. Tice-Colopy, K. 2010. Investing in members: Ohio redefines its purpose and services. Young Chil-

dren 65 (5): 66–68. Tierney, J. 2011. Do you suffer from decision fatigue? New York Times, August 17. www.nytimes.

com/2011/08/21/magazine/do-you-suffer-from-decision-fatigue.html?pagewanted=all.

49Chapter 3 Making Tough Decisions

Web resources Blink: Thin-Slicing Skills

www.gladwell.com/blink Create Organization Charts

http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/powerpoint-help/create-organization-charts-and-other-diagrams- HA001132750.aspx

Group Decision-Making Tool Kit www.extension.iastate.edu/communities/tools/decisions

Improve Employee Performance with Improv www.marshallgoldsmithlibrary.com/cim/articles_print.php?aid=661

Make Decisions https://career.berkeley.edu/Plan/MakeDecisions.stm

Overcoming Perfectionism www.livestrong.com/article/14702-overcoming-perfectionism

Thought Awareness, Rational Thinking, and Positive Thinking www.mindtools.com/pages/article/newTCS_06.htm

4 Leading on Purpose: The Road to Making a Difference

Case Study—Jamilah Jamilah’s classroom purrs with activity. Senior citizen volunteer Ms. Maisie reads Cassie her favorite stories; Joshua and Trey paint a solar system awash with glittery pearl and gold shooting stars; Eliza and Mimi puzzle over where to dig a pond for frogs’ eggs. Although Jamilah is content with her work, she is ready for something more. She dreams of building her own school. She would name it “Jamilah’s Neighborhood.” Looking around her community, Jamilah sees a number of early childhood centers, a Head Start program, faith-based nursery schools, and family child care providers. “They all want to help children,” Jamilah ponders. “How is my dream any different?” Jamilah asks you to level with her: “What is all this vision and mission stuff about? All these programs sound the same to me! I want Jamilah’s Neighborhood to stand out and be special.”

One of our chief jobs in life, it seems to me, is to realize how rare and valuable each one of us really is—that each of us has something which no one else has or ever will have—something inside which is unique to all time.

—Fred Rogers

Before emotional and social intelligence theory came about, common practice for identifying one’s purpose, vision, mission, and core values was linear and rational. A leader first identified the impact she wanted to make, focused in on drafting her workplace mission, and whittled down from there. Recent management theory, however, embraces social intelligence, which includes social awareness—what we sense about others—and social facility—what we then do with that awareness (Goleman 2006, 84). Finding our vision and mission is a far more internal, subjective, and individual process. Carter

51

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I, I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference.

—Robert Frost, “The Road Less Taken”

52 Part I Forming

and Curtis (2010) encourage us to search our heart for what is important. This chapter invites you on an adventure to search your heart for the kind of leader you have the potential to be.

Purpose, the heartbeat of our existence To lead by inspiration, a leader must first find and tap into her source of inspiration. Purpose is our deepest motivating force. Derived from our life story, purpose is deep- ened by the difficulties we face. Rather than running from failures or attempting to cover up inadequacies, leaders who do well embrace the hard knocks and disappoint- ments in their lives (Bryant 2011). Staff will trust leaders who are true to themselves and who remain resilient during challenging times. “It’s striking to hear teachers describe the contrast between direc- tors who work with a vision and those who settle for how things are. The word ‘vision’ isn’t always used, but they excitedly describe how their director really inspired them to work at the center, how ‘she’s usually got a twinkle in her eye,’ is always ‘showing us pictures or little quotes to expand our thinking,’ or ‘keeps her eyes on the prize even when the budget comes up short’” (Carter 2000, 99). Purpose gives meaning to our lives and intentionality to our work. Purpose gives us clarity in confusion, hope in discour- agement, and courage to do the right thing. Consider how Jamilah’s purpose affects her actions in the chapter case study. If you asked her to define her purpose, Jamilah might tell you that she “was born to” instill happiness, respect, and confidence in children. This purpose will inspire her to leave the comfort of her classroom behind and establish her own school. Later, as she develops her vision, mission, and goals for her center, she will return to her purpose again and again just as a hiker takes out a compass to find her destination. [See Helpful Definitions.]

Finding your purpose: The “inner longing” How do you uncover your purpose? Author Stephen Covey believes each of us intuitively knows our purpose. “Deep within each one of us there is an inner longing to live a life of great- ness and contribution—to really matter, to really make a difference,” Covey advises (2004b, 28). Some of us have to dig harder than others do to uncover that longing within, and the discovery process often takes a lifetime. No matter how much effort and time your excavating takes, be gentle with yourself. Your efforts will one day hit paydirt. As Confucius once wisely said, “Choose a job you love and you will never work a day in your life.”

u EXERCISE YOUR EQ n To gain a clearer sense of your purpose, explore each of these activities:

1. Name three traits you had as a child that you still have today. These traits will help you identify your gifts and strengths.

Helpful Definitions 1. Purpose is your reason for living, your deepest

passion. 2. Vision is your dream of how you can change your

world. 3. Mission is the practical way you will turn your dream

into reality. 4. Goals are specific milestones for accomplishing your

mission. 5. Objectives are steps you take, and a way to measure

your progress toward accomplishing goals. 6. Core values remind us, while making decisions, what

we stand for.

Those who bring sunshine to the lives of others cannot keep it from themselves.

—Sir James Barrie

53Chapter 4 Leading on Purpose

2. Recall a time in your life when you felt you were doing exactly what you were meant to do. This is what living “on purpose” feels like.

3. Identify a person who noticed your potential. What did that person see in you? Others often serve as messengers to help us see what we cannot yet see in our- selves.

4. Describe a time when you experienced “flow” (Csikszentmihalyi 1991), meaning you did not need to think about what you had to do, you just did it. You may have felt that everything came naturally to you.

5. Ask three people you trust and who care about you: “When have you seen me at my happiest?” . . . “What impact do you believe I can have on the world around me?”

6. What contribution would you most like to make? Some people find it helpful to imagine what they’d like written on their gravestone. Others think about what might be said about them at their retirement party.

Your turn has come. Let go of the need to be perfect or to get it just right, or the man- date to please anyone else. This moment is yours. Complete the following sentence: My purpose on earth is to: ______________________________________________________.

For some people, a purpose will flow like a stream from the tips of their pens. Others will feel stuck. Still others will find themselves squinting to see a purpose that seems just beyond their view. Be kind to yourself. Wherever you are in this process is where you are meant to be. As children need time to grow, your purpose needs time to unfold. Ask yourself, “What am I meant to do?” This will help you discover your pur- pose. Then ask, “How does knowing my purpose clarify for me the leader I want to be?”

Vision Vision is your dream of how your world will be when you are being true to your pur- pose. Having a vision means taking the long view and looking at the big picture. As you envision the way you want the world to improve, remain true to your purpose as you interact with others and make daily decisions. Leading on purpose is the everyday, lived commitment to make your vision come true. Recall the chapter case study, in which Jamilah’s purpose was to instill happiness, respect, and confidence in children. Her next step is to envision a special world where every child feels worthwhile and loved. Stephen Covey’s best-selling book The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People (2004a) shares ways to successfully problem-solve in both personal and professional situations, a critically important skill for early childhood administrators. Covey’s later book, The 8th Habit (2004b), discusses “finding your voice.” Covey invites you to cultivate these positive behaviors:

Habit 1: Be proactive. Habit 2: Begin with the end in mind. Habit 3: Put first things first. Habit 4: Think win/win. Habit 5: Seek first to understand, then to be understood. Habit 6: Synergize—creatively cooperate. Habit 7: Sharpen the saw—stay clear and open to possibilities. Habit 8: Find your voice and inspire others to find theirs (Covey 2004a, b).

Each of these habits will help you discover and hone your vision.

When our inner longing catches fire with our per- sonal vision, we come into our own as leaders.

Each person’s work is al- ways a portrait of himself.

—Samuel Butler

As soon as you trust yourself, you will know how to live.

—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

54 Part I Forming

Everyone has a pathway that is unique. No one else has exactly the same vision you do of how to change the world. As early childhood professionals, our vision often focuses on making the world better, safer, and happier for children and families. When you know your purpose and have a vision of how it will manifest on earth, you are ready for the practical step of articulating your mission.

Articulating your mission Your mission is the practical way in which you will make your dream come true, thereby fulfilling your unique purpose. Jamilah’s purpose is to help every child know his or her preciousness. Jamilah’s vision is to create an early childhood program where children are treated as precious. Her program’s mission is: “Where children learn their worth as they explore their neighborhood and world.” A mission is strong and true when it meets these standards:

• Inspires everyone who hears it. • Empowers staff to find their own purpose within the greater mission. • Shines steadily like a lighthouse when storms bluster. • Sets a standard for quality performance. • Reflects our deepest core values. • Informs every decision. • Remains timeless.

Above all, a mission is personal, and true to one’s purpose and vision.

u EXERCISE YOUR EQ n  Margie Carter and Deb Curtis, authors of The Visionary Director (2010), can help you discover your mission as an early childhood leader. Think about which goal represents your highest priority:

• To provide a service for parents while they work. • To give kids a head start to be ready for school and academic success. • To enhance children’s self-concept and social skills as they learn to get along in the

world. • To ensure children have a childhood that is full of play, adventure, and investiga-

tion. • To create a community where adults and children experience a sense of belonging

and new possibilities for making the world a better place. • ___________________________________________________________________________ (Add your own words here)

u EXERCISE YOUR EQ n  Find and examine the mission statement of your cur- rent organization, program, college, or university. To what extent does it actually reflect the goals of its mission statement? Now imagine that you are the director of a child care center; write your own mission statement. How does your mission sup- port your purpose and vision?

The value of “core values” We all need touchstones. Touchstones keep us grounded. We touch them to remind our- selves of what matters. A touchstone is an object of value we return to again and again for clarity of purpose. Think of a touchstone as a precious sapphire, ruby, or smooth chunk of turquoise. Touching that precious stone can feel reassuring, cool, soothing;

Dreams are the touch- stones of our characters.

—Henry David Thoreau

55Chapter 4 Leading on Purpose

touching might remind you of how you came to find it. Core values are touchstones for your work. A core value, like a touchstone, reminds you who you are and how you want to lead your life. Leaders who live by their core values act with integrity. Integrity is aligning your decisions with your core values. One example of a core value is honesty. Leaders with this core value look without blinders at their opportunities, challenges, and blind spots. With honesty as a touch- stone, leaders cannot hide in denial or procrastination. Lightheartedness, the ability to keep perspective and not take oneself too seriously, is another core value. Lighthearted leaders have an abiding sense of humor and are optimistic and hopeful. Other core values include:

• Respect • Courage • Inclusiveness • Compassion • Humility • Hope and optimism • Hard work • Creativity • Conflict resolution today • Community involvement • Families come first

u EXERCISE YOUR EQ n  I work with an early childhood leader whose purpose is “Let people know what is wrong, so we can make it better.” As you can imagine, her core values are courage, hon- esty, and objectivity. What are the core values you could not live without? As you name these, consider your purpose. Your core values and purpose are close companions. List several examples of your core values: ______________________________________________.

Your team’s purpose and core values Teams, like leaders, need a mission and core values. A helpful exercise is for staff members to write down their individual core values. They can follow that exercise by brainstorming their team’s core values together. Teams that are highly functioning typically find that the individual team members’ core values align with the team’s. Consultant and former director Ruby Martin leads child care organizations through a process of finding their vision, mission, goals, and objectives:

The process I use is very simple. It starts with the director of the center holding a staff meeting with all her employees and brainstorming what they would love for their cen- ter to look like. Someone during the meeting jots down all they key items the employ- ees would like to see. The director then takes all information pulled from the meeting and places it into a paragraph-long vision statement. All employees receive a copy to review and edit and get their feedback to the director.

Sample Early Childhood Mission Statements

• “Our mission is to provide lots of love to the children whose parents have to work to meet the demands of the society we live in. Our blueprint for this Child Care Cen- ter is excellent education, love, guidance, and a home away from home.”

—Baycrest Academy Child Care Center

• “‘Play with a purpose’ guides our unique age-specific programs and curricula, each designed to move your child ahead developmentally, intellectually, and socially in an environment that’s warm, nurturing, and fun.”

—La Petite Academy

• “A community that shapes and inspires children for the future.”

—Kiddie Academy

• “An educated society that contributes to an improved quality of life.”

—Region 19 Head Start

• “Provide a safe, stimulating, and nurturing environment in which young children can learn and grow…while focusing on healing from past trauma through love, sup- port, and stability.”

—The Salvation Army Harbor House Childcare Center

Leadership is the art of get- ting someone else to do what you want done, and to believe he wants to do it.

—Dwight Eisenhower

56 Part I Forming

This vision is then used as a tool at the next staff meeting to develop goals. The goals are pulled from the vision: areas to improve, disband, initiate. Each goal is then divided into Action Steps where employees are empowered to take on the responsibili- ties for reaching the goals. A timeline is set and the process begins. I always encourage centers to hold frequent team meetings throughout the action phase to keep on track. After the vision is fully met, I encourage them to go through the process again about once a year to make sure they are always improving, growing, and remaining focused on areas important to them. This process also works to create a vision for each classroom, only it just involves [that teacher] and director. (Personal correspondence, September 19, 2007)

Ruby might also invite the team to annually identify their core values. She could post the team’s core values and purpose in prominent places around her building as an inspirational reminder for the staff. Team decisions are far easier to make when choices are based on agreed upon core values. Many potential conflicts can be resolved by the parties referring back to these touchstones.

The S.M.A.R.T. method The five-step S.M.A.R.T. method of visioning and planning helps leaders turn their dreams into everyday realities. Peter Drucker (1954) is often credited with the concept of “management by objectives,” from which the S.M.A.R.T. method has evolved. The first step is to identify goals related to the mission statement. From there, lead- ers create measurable action items with timelines for success.

S: Develop Specific goals that will bring you closer to your mission. M: Determine how your success will be Measured. A: Make a list of Action items that will lead you closer to your goal. R: Identify the Resources you will need. T: Establish a Timeline for meeting your goal.

Examine the S.M.A.R.T. method in relation to the chapter case study. Jamilah’s purpose becomes real by

using the S.M.A.R.T. method as follows:

S: Jamilah wants to actively engage community members within the daily operations of her school.

M: She will measure success by monitoring weekly sign-in sheets for parents and community volunteers.

A: She needs to write e-mails and letters to parents and community organizations ask- ing for volunteers.

R: She will read relevant books and articles about establishing effective volunteer programs, and she will enlist the help of program staff in identifying areas of need.

T: She and her staff will establish an ongoing volunteer program within six months.

u EXERCISE YOUR EQ n  Try using the S.M.A.R.T. method to set and accomplish a goal. You can apply the process to a rainbow of situations, such as a school assignment, a workplace project, or an issue with a classmate or colleague. Using the five steps, identify a goal and mark your pathway to achievement.

S.M.A.R.T. Method • What Specifically do I want to achieve? • How will I Measure success? • What Actions do I need to take? • What Resources do I need? • What is my Timeline?

57Chapter 4 Leading on Purpose

Vision, purpose, and leadership Leaders, confident of the difference they want to make, inspire others to join them on the journey to make a difference. Effective leaders have a vision powerful enough to embrace the vision of oth- ers who work with them. Clear on their purpose, leaders inspire the best in others and invite others to live “on purpose” too. As Margie Carter (podcast) advises, “We can’t afford to not dream!” Consider the chapter case study. Now let’s say that Jamilah takes her enthusiasm, with her business plan, to her local bank. Jamilah’s vision, and her S.M.A.R.T. legwork, inspires the bank’s lending officer to grant her requests. That banker will delight in hearing about the progress Jamilah makes and will attend the opening of Jamilah’s Neighborhood. Leaders are everyday, real, “perfectly imperfect” people (Mellody & Miller 1989). A teacher is a leader in her classroom. Parents are leaders in their home. A child is a leader in learning all about his world. Leaders connect with fellow travelers to create environments for growth. In his book The Fifth Discipline, management expert Peter Senge (2006) calls these environments “learning organizations,” spaces where everyone grows, learns, and supports the growth and learning of others. Does this sound like the early childhood profession? You bet it does.

Servant leadership: “Paying it forward” Consider another valuable management theory in knowing yourself as a leader. This concept is called “servant leadership” (Greenleaf 1970). Understanding servant leader- ship will help you move from self-knowledge to knowledge of what motivates others, just as your EQ strengthens your social-emotional intelligence. Servant leaders dedicate themselves to listening to and enhancing the well-being of those around them. Humility is the servant leader’s core value. Servant leaders don’t concern themselves with self-promotion. They know that helping others grow helps everyone, including them. Servant leaders ask, “Do those served grow as persons? Do they, while being served, become healthier, wiser, freer, more autonomous, more likely themselves to become servants?” For women and people of color, the word servant does not usually have positive connotations. Such groups have a history of being coerced into serving others who have taken the service for granted. When you are a servant, you leave your personal dreams at someone else’s door. This term, “servant leader,” reveals the complexity of leadership. People who feel obligated to be leaders are rarely content or effective. When you choose to be a leader, however, you are doing what you are meant to do naturally. A ser- vant leader, in the kindest meaning of the term, stands ready to work in service to the greater good. Servant leaders serve by choice, not coercion. Servant leaders acknowl- edge the value of those they serve. Early childhood servant leaders are committed to bettering the lives of children, families, and staff in their care. Altruism, looking out for others, can be liberating if free of codependency. Altru- ism is giving back to the world generously, freely, and without expectation of praise or recognition. Codependency is relying upon others for our self-worth. People who are codependent manipulate others to gain praise and acknowledgment for themselves. Servant leadership is free of obligation and codependency. Servant leadership is altruism at its best. “Paying it forward” is another way to describe servant leadership.

The best and noblest lives are those set to high ideals.

—Rene Almeras

The privilege of a lifetime is being who you are.

—Joseph Campbell

Bam!radio

“Being a Visionary Leader During Difficult Times”

Interview with Maggie Carter

Heart to Heart Conversations on Leadership

58 Part I Forming

Like paying the toll taker not just for your toll but also the person’s behind you, you selflessly brighten another’s life. When we are working and living “on purpose,” we grace our worlds with our gifts. Servant leaders display heroism by freely offering the best of themselves to children, families, staff, and communities. Altruism leads to an inner sense of serenity and completion. Futurists Margaret Wheatley and Deborah Frieze offer a fresh vision of “servant leadership” in urging us to leave behind the expectation that leaders should be heroes with all the answers. Wheatley notes, “Our current way of solving problems is not solving problems. No one knows what to do; but collectively, we all know what to do” (podcast). Wheatley and Frieze propose leaders serve instead as hosts. Leader “hosts” invite staff to be at the forefront of leading change, while the host steps back to provide

facilitation and support. Host leaders make use of resources such as “World Café” (see Brown & Isaacs 2005) to engage all stakeholders. Both servant and host leadership invite us to go deep to find the place where our individual vision aligns with the deepest vision of the community we serve. Look back at your purpose, vision, mission, and core values. Articulating each of these clarifies who you are as a leader. Now you can look at your style of leadership. Knowing your style helps you communicate your vision and purpose to others.

Myers-Briggs leadership inventory Each of us will have a highly individual leadership style. Directors are not fungible (interchangeable, one for the other), they can share similar preferences. You may find it helpful to know what you and others have in common, as well as where you are unique. A study of styles to find where you land on the leadership continuum can be enlighten- ing. Insights you gain by learning about leadership styles will enhance your leadership EQ competencies. Carl Jung, the Swiss psychologist, traveled the world to live among and observe different cultures and people. He concluded that although we are unique, we also have commonalities. One commonality, for example, is that each of us is either right- or left- handed. Jung (1961) set about identifying other human commonalities, or “preferences.” Some people, he discovered, preferred to lead quiet and reflective lives, gathering their energy from within (Introverts). Others preferred to be social, outgoing, and gregarious, gathering their energies from the environment (Extraverts, also spelled extroverts). Jung placed these preferences on a continuum with two opposite poles. Right- and left-hand- edness sit at opposite sides of the handedness continuum. Similarly, introversion and extroversion sit at opposite ends of the preference continuum:

Right-handers………………………………………………………………………………………………Left-handers Extraverted…………………………………………………………………………………………………….Introverted

Mother-daughter team Katherine Cook Briggs and Isabel Briggs Myers translated Jung’s work into a highly validated, easy-to-take leadership inventory. Millions of people around the world have taken the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) questionnaire since its inception in 1943. Myers-Briggs research provides us with significant insights into how leaders and their team members function. Throughout the following sections, you will have a chance to explore your own

As you dream, so shall you become.

—Ralph Waldo Emerson

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“Rethinking Leadership Expectations: Moving from Hero to Host”

Interview with Margaret (Meg) Wheatley

Heart to Heart Conversations on Leadership

59Chapter 4 Leading on Purpose

personal preferences and temperament type. Although this material is not intended to be used as a scientifically validated assessment instrument, it provides an in-depth overview of the MBTI. The following MBTI descriptions are based on my more than 25 years as an MBTI practitioner and certified MBTI administrator. (For additional informa- tion about the MBTI and online instruments, visit The Myers & Briggs Foundation at www.myersbriggs.org/.) Using the following information, you will be able to assess your leadership style and temperament. You also will be able to use this information to grow yourself as a leader, and help others grow.

Your leadership style and temperament Let’s examine the four different preferences that people around the world exhibit (Kroeger, Thuessen, & Rutledge 2002; Myers et al. 1998):

Extraversion (E)……………………………………………………………………………………….Introversion (I) Sensing (S)…………………………………………………………………………………………………….Intuition (N) Thinking (T)……………………………………………………………………………………………………..Feeling (F) Judging (J)………………………………………………………………………………………………….Perceiving (P)

As you read along, you may find that you identify with each preference somewhat. An outgoing leader may also need “quiet time,” for example. A spontaneous, free-spirited teacher can also meet deadlines. Jung found, however, that most of us have preferences that place us more toward one end of each continuum than the other. Leaders face situations daily that require them to be real and authentic. Jung called this our “true self.” As you study the preferences below, ask yourself, “Who am I when I am not playing one of my roles (teacher/director, parent, student, daughter)?” Take a look now at each of the MBTI types in the MBTI Overview (next page) to assess which better describes you.

Introverts and Extraverts

Are you an E or an I? Your E/I preference identifies the source of your energy.

Case Study—Gustavo and Willow Energetic Gustavo, loved by families, is forever creating new activities for his after- school children. His team teacher, Willow, prefers to stay in the background. Willow is most comfortable helping individual children with their homework. Whenever Gustavo and Willow attempt to plan curriculum together, Willow sits quietly while Gustavo enthusiastically shares one idea after another. You are asked to help these teachers “speak each other’s language.” What rec- ommendations could you make to help Gustavo listen to Willow, and help Willow speak up for what’s important to her?

Have you noticed a staff member who rarely speaks up? Then, like Willow, when she finally shares her thoughts, she amazes everyone with the depth of her insights? This person is an Introvert. She derives her energy from within. She prefers to think things through quietly. The latest MBTI data finds that Introverts make up 51 percent of Americans (Myers et al. 1998, 157–58) Extraverts are noted for their energetic, friendly, and talkative nature. They thrive on social interaction and prefer to talk things through with others.

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